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Mast Step and Partners

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  • 16 Mar 2011 17:14
    Quote
    Reply # 547061 on 546667
    Anonymous member
    Graham Cox wrote:
    Robert Groves wrote:

    The wedges would work loose at first so we attached small blocks to the wedges on the underside of the deck and put a rope cinch knot close to the deck around the upper portions of the wedges. We have had no problems with wedges moving or wearing at all. The masts were stepped last in 2007 and was removed this past fall without problem.

    Taking masts in and out is not a job that I enjoy doing but making it simple and painless has been worth the effort. We  waxed the masts heavily in the fall with special attention to the area of the partners. We'll do more waxing in the spring. With this attention to detail we are seeing no signs of corrosion to the masts at the steps and partners.

     I am interested in Robert's comment s about his mast wedges.  I have steel partners and have considered using a two part rubber compound in order to be kind to the paint but small irregularities in the steel tube mean that I would most likely have to dig it out with a chisel when I wanted to remove the mast.  Wedges would make that task much easier, and I suspect I will need to remove the mast occasionally for maintenance to the steel structures..  Making the timber wedges would be a fiddly task I assume.  What experience have other  members had with wedges or rubber?


    Hi Graham,

    Edmond Dantes have a wooden mast and the partner is stainless steel. It was manufactured as a tube and a had to fibreglass it to make it wedge shaped, smaller diameter at the bottm than at the top. That makes the wedges easier to make, and they dont drop thrugh when installing them. What this shape does however, is lifting the mast!!! You have to bolt it to the lower partner. The recomandation to make that part square is also important because of the twisting forces on the mast is great. I tried to do without the sealing silicone on top of the wedges, but that resulted in a lifting mast. I could observe the lifting after the last regatta wich was rather windy, only because I had made a pecil line.

    Regards

    Ketil
  • 16 Mar 2011 05:44
    Quote
    Reply # 546807 on 534932
    Deleted user
    There has been much discussion about mast wedges and alternatives among Freedom owners.  To the best of my knowledge, all Freedoms have FRP partners, and all but a few very early ones have carbon fiber masts.

    Freedom originally used hard polyurathane rubber wedges.  They were long gone when we purchased Flutterby.  In our case, there was Spartite poured around our masts.  It was very difficult to remove the masts, due to badly gouged partners that the molded rubber "locked" into, plus some molding problems leaving a lip below the partners on the less accessible main mast.  The spartite wedges were destroyed getting the masts out.

    We repaired the fiberglass around the partners and re-painted it before we poured our replacement. We used mold release on the partners but not on the mast.  Our partners are tapered so the poured part is a wedge. 

    If the partners were cylindrical, or if I couldn't fair and paint them smooth I would probably do something else instead like traditional wooden wedges..

    We did not use Spartite because it is expensive, and it is also reported to be too soft for a freestanding mast.  Instead we used a harder PU rubber compound called PMC-790.

    You can read more about it on this thread from the Freedom owners forum. http://freedomyachts.org/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=47

    I did my homework....but haven't passed all the tests yet: The masts have been up for less than six months.  They haven't fallen down or leaked (We used additional bedding above and they are clamped in above and below, so there is no way the wedge could work out of the partners).  But no sailing to date (still working on sails), and no attemps to remove the masts either.
  • 16 Mar 2011 01:24
    Quote
    Reply # 546667 on 534932
    Anonymous member
    Robert Groves wrote:

    The wedges would work loose at first so we attached small blocks to the wedges on the underside of the deck and put a rope cinch knot close to the deck around the upper portions of the wedges. We have had no problems with wedges moving or wearing at all. The masts were stepped last in 2007 and was removed this past fall without problem.

    Taking masts in and out is not a job that I enjoy doing but making it simple and painless has been worth the effort. We  waxed the masts heavily in the fall with special attention to the area of the partners. We'll do more waxing in the spring. With this attention to detail we are seeing no signs of corrosion to the masts at the steps and partners.

     I am interested in Robert's comment s about his mast wedges.  I have steel partners and have considered using a two part rubber compound in order to be kind to the paint but small irregularities in the steel tube mean that I would most likely have to dig it out with a chisel when I wanted to remove the mast.  Wedges would make that task much easier, and I suspect I will need to remove the mast occasionally for maintenance to the steel structures..  Making the timber wedges would be a fiddly task I assume.  What experience have other  members had with wedges or rubber?
  • 02 Mar 2011 13:37
    Quote
    Reply # 536609 on 534932
    Deleted user
    The mount is an all weather outdoor mount for use in parking lots in a Canadian winter where salt corrosion is an issue. Our forward mast boot leaked a lot of salt water at one point but no corrosion occured. The mount is heavily galvanized as are the bolts. Ideal for the marine envorinment. There is also an optional weather cap to go over the base if desired. We didn't bother with it.

    Our flagpoles were purchased through Ewing Flagpoles in Toronto, Ontario, Canada,

    http://www.ewingflagpole.com/

    I imagine this type of mount would be available anywhere in the world. I did my research by checking out all the flagpoles in front of government buildings, hospitals and schools until I found what I was looking for.
  • 01 Mar 2011 20:36
    Quote
    Reply # 535618 on 534932
    Anonymous member
    Wow, that certainly looks like a sturdy piece of kit. As long as it is mounted in a dry location, it looks to be perfect for the job.
    Sorry, I should have asked you for a link to your flagpole supplier as well. That would be worth adding to our links pages.
  • 01 Mar 2011 14:37
    Quote
    Reply # 535299 on 534932
    Deleted user
    I have placed a photo of the mast step in my Profile Photos. The step is not in its installed location but gives a good overview. It is welded steel, hot dip galvanized and lined with a vinyl plastic to isolate the aluminum mast from the galvanized steel base.
  • 01 Mar 2011 01:51
    Quote
    Reply # 534969 on 534932
    Anonymous member
    Hi Bob,
    Can you put a photo of your step fitting into either an album in your profile, or an album in Box, please? It sounds interesting - easily available, easily mountable and a viable departure from normal practice.
    David.
  • 01 Mar 2011 00:35
    Quote
    Message # 534932
    Deleted user
    On our first Easy Go, sloop rigged, corrosion of different metals on the deck stepped mast encouraged us to look at alternative methods of stepping the mast. The deciding moment came while cutting bolts and trying to drive out seized hardware.

    The Junk Rigged Easy Go uses flagpoles for masts and. more by accident than design, these poles came with the mounting systems that are normally bolted to the concrete foundations that flagpoles are normally found on.

    Under both of the steps we built up/ with wood and epoxy. a bed to which we could bond one inch bolts in place. The steps are a clam like affair that fit over the four one inch bolts and then clamp tightly around the mast. In addition a bolt is in the side of the base that goes into a hole in the mast to keep it from jumping out in heavy sees.

    The steps are easy to open up for removing the mast when necessary. All bolts are regularly oiled as part of the maintenance routine and so far we have not had any problems.

    The partners are built up on and under the deck and narrow spruce wedges are lightly driven into place. All are numbered and indexed on the partners to allow then to be replaced in their exact same locations every time they are removed.

    The wedges would work loose at first so we attached small blocks to the wedges on the underside of the deck and put a rope cinch knot close to the deck around the upper portions of the wedges. We have had no problems with wedges moving or wearing at all. The masts were stepped last in 2007 and was removed this past fall without problem.

    Taking masts in and out is not a job that I enjoy doing but making it simple and painless has been worth the effort. We  waxed the masts heavily in the fall with special attention to the area of the partners. We'll do more waxing in the spring. With this attention to detail we are seeing no signs of corrosion to the masts at the steps and partners.
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