Nice catch on the video!
I'm glad to see everybody wearing a PFD.
Please make sure your son's PFD wraps all around him.
When it is on like in the video, if he falls overboard and is unconscious, that PFD will make him float face down.
Thanks for sharing the video!
what failed to cause that demasting?
MN3
It was a bad shroud
The wire broke? (rare)
or an end fitting? (more common)
airplane fitting or swaged?
Edited by MN3 on Apr 03, 2020 - 10:44 AM.
MN3
For that reason I often don't allow to use the leeward front seat, especially for kids.
I have had that very experience while trapped out om a SC19. The pigtail above the roller furling swivel failed at the Nicopress eye that was shackled to the mast hound.The thimble used was too large so as the wire exited the Nicopress it bent outwards at to wide an angle. This caused a stress point in the wire.
Getting a fully battened main sail under control once the rig is down around your head is a chore. We had to remove all the battens before we could get the sail off the mast and then get the rig on the tramp. A jet skier who was watching from his dock came out and gave us a tow back to the beach. Check your rigging often!
Edited by gahamby on Apr 03, 2020 - 04:54 PM.
I consider myself lucky, only lost the rig once, in calm conditions right off Rabbit Key, shroud pin either failed or came loose, I never found it. Rig slowly toppled over into the water. I recovered it, paddled back, unrigged, got organized, rerigged and headed off to Islamorada. Scared me so much I double and triple check everything and replace more than I should, if there is such a thing. Other than the tow in, seems like most demastings on cats cause little damage and few injuries, knock on wood
The thimble used was too large so as the wire exited the Nicopress it bent outwards at to wide an angle. This caused a stress point in the wire.
yup - inspect and refuse new crimps that aren't perfect
I consider myself lucky, only lost the rig once, in calm conditions right off Rabbit Key, shroud pin either failed or came loose, I never found it.
My money is the ring-ding got snagged, bent and came off... thus allowing your shroud to be free (i have never seen nor heard of a correctly sized pin actually failing on a beach cat)
I have lost my mast many times. had sidestay and bow tangs fail, had swages fail, thimbles fail, wire strands break, wire fail at a swage, also had airplane fittings crack and shackles as well...
it all has a shelf life +/- storage and use conditions
MN3
My money is the ring-ding got snagged, bent and came off... thus allowing your shroud to be free (i have never seen nor heard of a correctly sized pin actually failing on a beach cat)
Once on a Hobie 16 we surmised the spit ring got caught on the righting line and the shroud adjuster pin came out and the mast came down. There was no one on the bay that day and it was blowing hard, no beach nearby and getting blown towards a seawall with lots of barnacles and oysters to cut us up. We got the sail out of the mast track and the mast and boom across the tramp. We were desperately waving the jib to attract the attention of the only boat in sight. We were saved. It would have been a mess being blown into the seawall and we would have been climbing up on a dock at some rich person's house. What we learned is use cotter pins instead of split rings for things that are crucial and use those plastic shroud adjuster covers. Also, I used to keep my boat in a mast up storage facility where I would get lazy and didn't check the things up top very often. That's one advantage to having to step the mast every time we go out.
Once on a Hobie ...
What we learned is use cotter pins instead of split rings for things that are crucial
yup - good lessons fo sure
but i won't be using cotters on my shroud adjusters. I do have plastic covers and on almost every other location .. rigging tape
when a cotter pin is not appropriate .... tape it up! - it's easy to see if the tape has been fouled and should be looked closer at
MN3
Great catch! Unless I miss my guess, that's an old (BW-era) SC19 (judging from the boomless rig, hull graphics, wraparound tramp) like mine. They used Nicopress back then. Tom changed everything to roller-swaged. And now I think I'll be upgrading, because I don't want to be That Guy (again).
cholley12 wrote: Here yall go
Well done video! Got any pics of how your boom camera mount is setup?
The video shows how most dis-mastings happen, with the mast dropping fairly slowly away from the crew on the windward side. Meaning anyone terrified of the mast crashing down on them if something fails might be reassured.
I've been around quite a few dismastings over the years (never my own boat, knock on wood) and don't remember anyone ever being injured during one.
____________
Damon Linkous
Though it should be noted that on the SC the dismasting should be less chaotic than on many other boats. Because of the Highfield levers used to make righting easier, the ball is captive in the mast base, so the mast is simply going to fall down and stay put, rather than coming loose of the base and getting dragged into the water.
Wait - might have to check that. Falling down 90 degrees abeam may be beyond the limit of travel for the ball in the base and break something.
Edited by jonathan162 on May 29, 2020 - 01:14 PM.
A captive mast base can cause problems during a dismasting because the leverage created can easily damage the crossbar, mast, mast base casting, or dolphin striker post. It can also cause problems with recovering the mast on the water because detaching the mast base from the step may be difficult, especially if the retaining pin becomes bent during the dismasting. Better to let the mast separate from the crossbar. On our Hobies with captive ball mast steps, we always remove the pin before sailing.
That said, if you use a shroud lengthening system for righting, then retaining the mast base to the crossbar is necessary and you would want to leave the pin in or be sure to insert it before lengthening the shroud.
sm
Steve M.
DamonLinkous wrote: [quote=cholley12]Here yall go
Well done video! Got any pics of how your boom camera mount is setup?
The video shows how most dis-mastings happen, with the mast dropping fairly slowly away from the crew on the windward side. Meaning anyone terrified of the mast crashing down on them if something fails might be reassured.
I've been around quite a few dismastings over the years (never my own boat, knock on wood) and don't remember anyone ever being injured during one.
I'll try to get you some pics later but I use ram mounts c size ball on a clamp on the end of the boom. Works decently well till the action gets real rough then it moves around. Im going to put some grit into the clamp to see it it holds the ball better