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How to break a mast on a Stiletto 27...fyi #235344
07/28/11 12:01 PM
07/28/11 12:01 PM
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 144
Near SLC, Utah
tomthouse Offline OP
member
tomthouse  Offline OP
member

Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 144
Near SLC, Utah
Here's how to break a mast while launching a Stiletto 27:

I suppose you guys should hear it straight from the source.



Instead of a trip to San Pedro or Marina Del Ray, Catalina, or Carlos and the Sea of Cortez, I'll be paying a bit of "stupid tax"; you know, the price for doing something really stupid.



It started with "being in a hurray", to get the boat launched.



After all, I've been working on it for the past couple of months.



I know that being in a hurry is a "bad beginning' to most things.



I've launched the boat lots of time by myself with no help, so no big deal, right?



Indeed this season's maiden voyage was to be on our own Bear Lake, Idaho, in preparation for trips to far-way, warm and exotic places....or for more local goof off sailing.



The way I often launch the boat by my self, in our local lake, is to back the trailer into the water barely up to the bottom of the hulls.



The lake doesn't drop off into deep water, it is just shallow for a long ways, so I launch with a tractor and run it way out and still the boat doesn't touch the water.



Next thing I do and on this occasion did, is to set an anchor off the rear beam and simply drive the tractor forward and the boat eases off the trailer and into the water.



Everything was going as it usually does and as a result, I wasn't paying attention.



This is the first time in the water after raising the mast a week ago.



Well, I didn't notice that I still had my spinnaker halyard cleated at one end and attached to the trailer's front mast cradle at the other end.



As I drove the tractor forward, the boat didn't budge off the trailer, but the mast did snap about six or eight feet dowm from the mast head.



I've seen completely screwed up days as a loved one expired due to cancer.



I've seen really really bad days when I was responsible for a couple of hostage rescues at the prison.

I've had really bad days when I was responsible for the resolution of prison riots.



Compared to any of that, this wasn't the worst day of my life, but it certainly wasn't the finest example of paying attention to small details.



Now I have to pay the price to fix or replace the mast (aka: stupid tax).



Just in case you are thinking about suggesting that I untie the spinnaker halyard...that was one of the first things I did....after the mast broke and came crashing down....



I'm just surprised that the mast didn't come straight down and crown me square in the head as I sat on the tractor.

Yep, not a stellar day, but still.... not as bad as some I've experienced.



Oh ya.....and just so I can get it all out of my system:

!@#$%^&*()_+...!!!!


I mean, Jesus wants me for a sun beam, a sun beam, a sun beam...la, la, la, la...

-- Have You Seen This? --
Re: How to break a mast on a Stiletto 27...fyi [Re: tomthouse] #235435
07/29/11 03:25 PM
07/29/11 03:25 PM
Joined: Jul 2008
Posts: 57
Q
Quarath Offline
journeyman
Quarath  Offline
journeyman
Q

Joined: Jul 2008
Posts: 57
Ouch!!! what a bummer. I hope you have good luck in getting a replacement.


Re: How to break a mast on a Stiletto 27...fyi [Re: Quarath] #235442
07/29/11 04:49 PM
07/29/11 04:49 PM
Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 3,224
Roanoke Island ,N.C.
Team_Cat_Fever Offline
Carpal Tunnel
Team_Cat_Fever  Offline
Carpal Tunnel

Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 3,224
Roanoke Island ,N.C.
Almost the same thing happened to a guy I know with his TT 720. Same result.


"I said, now, I said ,pay attention boy!"

The cure for anything is salt water - sweat, tears, or the sea
Isak Dinesen
If a man is to be obsessed by something.... I suppose a boat is as good as anything... perhaps a bit better than most.
E. B. White
Re: How to break a mast on a Stiletto 27...fyi [Re: Team_Cat_Fever] #239456
10/28/11 09:11 AM
10/28/11 09:11 AM
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 144
Near SLC, Utah
tomthouse Offline OP
member
tomthouse  Offline OP
member

Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 144
Near SLC, Utah
I just thought some other fellow sailor, getting caught in winter's doldrums, might find some of this of some passing interest...so here's the rest of this continuing story:

Well, as some of you may recall, I wasn't paying enough attention and broke my mast while stepping it.

If one over-looks that misfortune, it was lucky that the top part of the mast missed me by only a few feet, when it came crashing down from being fully stepped.

Trying to find a suitable replacement was an adventure, but I was successful, thanks to Ron and Stiletto Catamarans.

They had an exact match, salvaged from a hurricane damaged boat.

(That was unlucky for the boat's owner, but fortunate for me.)

The problem for me was that it was located in Sarasota Florida.

We arranged to have them sand down and repaint the mast and they agreed to transport it as far as Bismarck, ND, while delivering a newly refurbished Stiletto 30 to a buyer in Saskatchewan, Canada.

Bismarck, was the closest intersecting point to Utah, on their route to their delivery in Canada.

(Do you know how unlikely it is to find someone that is doing a boat delivery to Canada, from Florida...little alone to find that the boat delivery is by someone who has a replacement Stiletto mast that would fit my boat?)

While I was using the internet, phone and other resources to arrange for a suitable place to off-load and temporarily store the mast, unitl I could drive there...I ran across a fellow sailor, in Minot, North Dakota. (Thanks Lee, Teamchums)

(Do you have any idea of how unlikely it is to find a sailor in North Dakota?)

I met him a few years earlier, while doing a goof off sail on beach cats going from San Pedro, CA to Catalina Island in a regatta kind of thing.

As luck would have it, he was temporarily assigned to the Minot, North Dakota area on a job.

(How unlikely is that?)

The next bit of luck is that his job assignment recently changed to a location in Arizona.

His travel route (and a girl friend's home) takes him through SLC, Utah on his way to Page, Arizona.

(More luck?)

He is also pulling a trailer, suitably long to easily carry the Stiletto's newly painted 36 foot mast.

(More luck?)

I have to say: Those are some pretty long odds, coming together, that is making this replacement mast thing, work out as well as it has.

This now gives me all winter to transfer the pieces and parts from the old mast to the replacement, so I'm ready for sailing again when the weather improves.

After taking all the hardware off the old mast, I'm thinking about cutting a couple of feet off it's base, or asking the Nichol brothers if they have a small mast section lying around....to be used as a sleeve to rejoin the broken mast.

It could make a dandy flag pole for the lake house...and a reminder that hurrying while planning, sailing or stepping a mast, can be costly and very inconvenient....if not down right dangerous.

So, what are the rest of you up to, now days...???

What adventutes are you having or planning?

Re: How to break a mast on a Stiletto 27...fyi [Re: tomthouse] #239462
10/28/11 10:21 AM
10/28/11 10:21 AM
Joined: Apr 2002
Posts: 695
Ft. Pierce, Fl. USA
Seeker Offline
addict
Seeker  Offline
addict

Joined: Apr 2002
Posts: 695
Ft. Pierce, Fl. USA
No "luck" involved....that
has God's finger prints all over it.

Re: How to break a mast on a Stiletto 27...fyi [Re: Seeker] #239481
10/29/11 06:30 AM
10/29/11 06:30 AM
Joined: Aug 2007
Posts: 1,304
Gulf Coast relocated from Cali...
TeamChums Offline
veteran
TeamChums  Offline
veteran

Joined: Aug 2007
Posts: 1,304
Gulf Coast relocated from Cali...
Strapping the mast to the top of my travel trailer tonight. Getting on the road in the morning. I'll see you in SLC sometime early afternoon Tom.


Lee

Keyboard sailors are always faster in all conditions.
Re: How to break a mast on a Stiletto 27...fyi [Re: Seeker] #239484
10/29/11 08:58 AM
10/29/11 08:58 AM
Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 3,224
Roanoke Island ,N.C.
Team_Cat_Fever Offline
Carpal Tunnel
Team_Cat_Fever  Offline
Carpal Tunnel

Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 3,224
Roanoke Island ,N.C.
Originally Posted by Seeker
No "luck" involved....that
has God's finger prints all over it.


God and Lee in the same thread is just scary.


"I said, now, I said ,pay attention boy!"

The cure for anything is salt water - sweat, tears, or the sea
Isak Dinesen
If a man is to be obsessed by something.... I suppose a boat is as good as anything... perhaps a bit better than most.
E. B. White
Re: How to break a mast on a Stiletto 27...fyi [Re: Team_Cat_Fever] #239490
10/29/11 10:50 AM
10/29/11 10:50 AM
Joined: Aug 2007
Posts: 1,304
Gulf Coast relocated from Cali...
TeamChums Offline
veteran
TeamChums  Offline
veteran

Joined: Aug 2007
Posts: 1,304
Gulf Coast relocated from Cali...
Quote
God and Lee in the same thread is just scary.


Amen.


Lee

Keyboard sailors are always faster in all conditions.
Re: How to break a mast on a Stiletto 27...fyi [Re: tomthouse] #239498
10/29/11 10:34 PM
10/29/11 10:34 PM
Joined: Jul 2001
Posts: 2,844
42.904444 N; 88.008586 W
Todd_Sails Offline
Carpal Tunnel
Todd_Sails  Offline
Carpal Tunnel

Joined: Jul 2001
Posts: 2,844
42.904444 N; 88.008586 W
Years ago, I had my mast break a spreader bar and warped like wholy he)), and limped it back to shore at the TX city dike. I found a replacement in of all places in California, from a N6.0 that had actually come from TX. to be used for a huge hangliding kite project on the boat.

Lee was moving to TX then, and trasported my replacement 6.0 mast BACK to Tx! Lee is a standup guy. Since sold the boat.

Thanks again Lee


F-18 Infusion
#626- SOLD it!

'Long Live the Legend of Chris Kyle'

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