I purchased a mast from Matt McDonald today after he sent me this information yesterday. He said it was O.K. to share this on the forum. I will be traveling from Toledo, Ohio to get the mast next month and would be willing to bring more back with me from Florida for some gas money.

Matt wrote: The most obvious difference in the aluminum versus the carbon sticks is in setting up the boat (stepping the mast). With you’re A class experience you understand. If righting the boat is an issue, then the carbon makes a difference here too. I am 5-7 and typically around 145-150 lbs. I can right the F16 with an aluminum stick solo only if it is relatively windy. I can right the boat solo with the carbon stick all the time. I feel we have less pitch in the boat with the carbon mast, and a bit more power off the wind. The F16 class when they set up their rules wanted to allow carbon masts. They put a minimum tip weight provision in the mast requirements though so that a super light high mod carbon stick would not start showing up that forced everyone racing to go out and get a carbon stick if they wanted to race competitively. As such the carbon sticks we make are not as light as they could be, but this hopefully helps with having added material, so that they are not as prone to busting as some of the latest versions of A class masts seem to be experiencing. There was a huge variation between the batches of aluminum masts we have bought over the years. You end up with something in the neighborhood of 6-8 pounds savings going with a carbon over the aluminum.

Our carbon shape is very similar to the shape used by most of the A class builders, which is also very similar to the current aluminum superwing section used on the F16s. (62 X 154mm)

We have been doing a lot of work on bends for this section. We have been working with the bendy masts along the same lines as the A class. Trying to maximize the bend fore and aft while keeping a stiffer side to side bend profile. This allows you to use a fuller main sail and to get a lot more range out of the set up. The stiffer side wall then helps you keep power in the sail off wind with the spin.

I have a couple of masts available now.