Folks,
I do not want to interrupt the flow here so I will make this short.
The fact is I keep all my emails both sent and rxd. I went looking back through them to find some mast deflection data and stumbled across emails about work I was doing on a composite mast.
Back in 2003 I made a carbon composite section 6m long and did some deflection tests without and then with cardon on the outside of the section. It's kind of nostalgic reading through the old emails. From the emails it seems this was just before building the Blade prototype.

How time flies.

I also did comparative deflection tests with a superwing and Aussie wing of the same length so I could see how this project compared. (The Aussie wing 50x125mm extruded in Australia in the 80s to combt the importation of Sori sections for the A cat fleet. But in reality it was too heavy.)
I have rough sketches that include all components and layups I used.
Anyone interested in doing a bit of experimenting I'd be happy to send these emails to you so you can either improve on what I had tried or just say oh well it is better done some other way.

It seems from the emails I had worked out a way of modifying the technique to produce an F16 mast that would weigh around 9.91kg without fittings. How is not detailed in the emails. But If pushed I could probably work it out again.
I never actually sailed with this mast just did static deflection tests. So no guarantees.

Anyhow just thought I'd mention it.

Regards,
Phill

I know that the voices in my head aint real,
but they have some pretty good ideas.
There is no such thing as a quick fix and I've never had free lunch!