Lead casting weekend

This is the most hated part of the mast assembly process. I have to melt and cast almost 60 kg of lead, the fumes of which are very harmful to health. 

What you see on the photo is a mast base extra weight. The other weight goes to the hound.

Mast spreader

The next step after designing lead bar incorporated into “the nose” is to design  spreader. Aerodynamic, slim design is a result of two prototypes tested last year.

New mast hound with lead bar

New delivery of the first batch from Moore Brothers Company is almost on the way. In the meantime I redesigned mast hound to accomodate lead bar. It is must for all full carbon masts and some of 6th generation masts as well. The lead bar will be casted into steel mold.  15 cm long bar weights close to 1,5kg. Just to remind you that mast must comply to minimum weight and balance point rule.

You can download this design. Go to DOWNLOAD menu at the top.

If you want to learn more about how to install mast hound go to my previous article here: Installing mast hound

Edge reinforcement

This picture represents damaged leading edge of the plank. As you see the damage happened right under the hull section when the plank under load is closest to the ice surface.  Sometimes the weather forms frozen ice and snow. If you hit it sailing at full speed it can be pretty dangerous.  Airfoil planks are shaped to have  narrow or close to sharp leading and trailing edge.  When hit by a hard body they may suffer. But this is nothing new.

To minimize the risk I have implemented following modification to my 2022-2023 planks:

  • both edges have small approx. 3mm radius
  • both edges are extra reinforced with glass tape

This should help in case of low and medium impact situations however I strongly advice  to stay away from all kind of obstacles.

Sail safe. 

Here it starts!

The time has came. Sailors from Canada, USA, Sweden, Finland, Germany and Poland were waiting for this moment. And here it starts. Samba cores are being trimmed to final lenght. Preps for rest of the weekend and first infusion probably on Monday/Tuesday. 
All planks have to be completed before first batch of masts arrive.