Sunday, 10/29, DCIB

[JimSouthwick]

One of the best days of the year at DC attracted an excellent turnout of "poleboarders" and a pair of kiteboarders. It started out VERY gusty, but soon settled down to a consistent SW direction and low 20s windspeed. Reasonably warm; I didn't see any gloves. Layne Peterson was clearly "sailor of the day." First, he ferried out a complete mast extension and base to George Ward, whose Euro-pin had broken. Then, as the session was winding down, he suffered a broken mast, but came up with a juryrig that enabled him to sail back.

http://utahwindriders.org/phpBB2/album.php?user_id=79

[layne.peterson]

P.S. Thanks to the folks that spotted me on the far side, had the splintered jury-mast failed, it would have been a really long swim back!

[DimitriMilovich]

Hey Layne,

As I was leaving I saw you sail into the beach on your new short long-clew "freestyle" rig. It looked like the mast broke at the tip. Is that so, or did you do some re-rigging? Also, just wondering what kind of mast it was?

Dimitri

[Trip Houk]

Layne,
I understand you broke your mast but figured some way to jury rig to sail back. Maybe for the benefit of those of us who are sailing ancient gear, you might describe your technique. Years ago I broke a mast at Sulfur and were it not for Dimo towing me to shore, I'd have been one hypothermic popsicle.

[layne.peterson]

The mast broke about 1" above the boom clamp just after I jibed and started powering up again, luckily it did no damage to the sail when it popped.

When I made it to the far side I pulled all three pieces out of the sail to evaluate what I could do with them. I slid the top unscathed piece through the bottom section of the lower half but the diameter was not enough for the pieces to hold together. I next tried putting the top of the broken section in the bottom half of the broken section and got it to lock together but the fractured section would not fit my extension so I popped the plastic end cap off and was able to push it into the fracture until it stopped. I was then able to rig my sail with about 3' to 4' feet of the sail folded over itself. I couldn't give it any down haul ("purchase" Rick H.) to speak of without pushing a hole in the sleeve but I was able to give it some decent out haul.

The wind had backed off enough that it held for the reach back to Island beach. Carl looked at the pieces back on the beach and put the bottom two sections together by sticking the top of the lower broken section into the fracture of the lower half and sliding the top piece into the other fractured end. In retrospect, even the top section would have worked to some degree by sliding it into the lower fractured section with full extension with the end cap in place but I would have had about 6' or more of the top section hanging over. I think the bottom line is that there is more that one way to assemble the pieces as long as you don't put too much pressure on the sections. I am just happy it didn't break in the Gorge this summer; I don't think it would have worked very well with a low volume board.

The mast was a 2 year old Powerex 460 blem with about 70% carbon content. The fracture zone looks like it did not wet completely with resin since there are some fiber strands that were not very rigid and I peeled away a long section fairly easy before I fed it back through the sail but the resin starvation is just my speculation at this point. We have a whole fleet of Powerex masts and a z-wave blem that is about 8 years old and still hanging tough.

[Carl Christensen]

Impressive work on Layne's part. By the time the rescue crew got to him he was able to sail back on his own in quite a respectable fashion although the top of his sail was folded over and flopping about four feet to leeward. That was quite a while after beaching himself on the rocky western shore beneath the Creeper tracks and rebuilding his entire rig too.

Good thing it wasn't really cold; cold yes, but not really cold yet. Gotta watch out for each other carefully this time of year. Despite the waning conditions Jim S didn't hesitate to drag his gear down to the water and launch again when it became clear that Layne was still out to sea. No surprise there. He and another brave soul sailed the whole way over to see if they could help.

BTW Jim: You probably had as good a look as anyone at the upwind conditions, how do you think Island Beach compared to Sailboat Beach? Apparently there weren't many, (any?), 7 m sails out at Island Beach for a while.

[JimSouthwick]

All I know about the conditions at SBB on Sunday is what I read in Eric's post; sounds as if it was somewhat less windy and/or steadier there than at IB, a really unusual circumstance if true.

[Trip Houk]

Layne,
Thanks for the self rescue instruction. This is similar to what Robbie Naish recommended in an issue about 5 years ago. In my episode, I tried that technique unsuccessfully while floundering around in 20+ winds and 40 degree water. It is extreemly difficult to paddle a rig ashore while straddeling your wrapped sail and boom. Better to follow Eric"s instructions and keep an eye on each other.
I'm glad that you made it back unscathed. It does make me think I should pull out the 460 blems I bought at the swap for inspection!