Posted by William A. Cormack (wacormack@…>)
I’ll be attaching a block for a flag halyard near the top of my 1986 F-36 mast. Is it OK to drill & tap for 10-24 machine screws and install with locktite? If rivets are the way to go what amount of reach is appropriate.
If someone could comment on the reasoning for the choice of machine screw or rivet I would appreciate it.
Thanks
Bill
_________________________________________________William A. Cormack, CPAPrincipal and Chief Financial OfficerWhelan Associates, LLCCorporate Real Estate ServicesBourne Counting House at One Merrill’s WharfNew Bedford, MA 02740Voice: 508-984-4100, Fax: 508-984-4101, Cell 508-254-5828MailTo:wacormack@…
Posted by JoanJohn@… (JoanJohn@…)
Hi Bill.
From the little I have gleaned so far about carbon fiber masts (see previous emails, mine and others) passive is the way to go.
A self-threading screw would be asking for big trouble, of course, as in fiberglass. Rivets, I am not sure about (do they put expansion pressure laterally when they are pulled tight?).
A threaded hole for a machine screw is passive when not under load. That’s what I am doing for attaching things to the CF mast.
Any metal penetrating the carbon fiber should have Loctite red, since is a conductor (open a standard non-alkaline, non-lithium D cell battery sometime and note the carbon rod down the middle).
Mu two cents.
John Ernst
F45 CC owner
Posted by macks011 (macks04@…>)
How about bolting an eye strap to the aluminum mast head truck and
attaching a block? Run the halyard to the bow pulpit.
— In freedomyachts2003@yahoogroups.com, “William A. Cormack”
<wacormack@w…> wrote:
I’ll be attaching a block for a flag halyard near the top of my
1986 F-36 mast. Is it OK to drill & tap for 10-24 machine screws
and install with locktite? If rivets are the way to go what amount
of reach is appropriate.
If someone could comment on the reasoning for the choice of
machine screw or rivet I would appreciate it.
Thanks
Bill
William A. Cormack, CPA
Principal and Chief Financial Officer
Whelan Associates, LLC
Corporate Real Estate Services
Bourne Counting House at One Merrill’s Wharf
New Bedford, MA 02740
Voice: 508-984-4100, Fax: 508-984-4101, Cell 508-254-5828
MailTo:wacormack@w…
Posted by Tom Curley (kd7yzq@…>)
Greetings:
Just thought I’d throw my $0.02 in …
Several years ago I installed StrongTrak on both masts of my F28
catketch, having had great luck with the stuff on my previous boat, a
Pearson 23C. What really precipitated the leap to StrongTrak was that
the aluminum rivets attaching the aluminum sailtracks to the carbon-
fiber masts were deteriorating, pulling out and jamming the sailcars
going up (or worse, coming down). On the 28 Freedom used a sailtrack
design in which the rivets are attached in the middle of the
sailtrack, unlike the 36 and 38 cat-sloops I’ve seen where the
attachment points are on the outside edges, not in the track (MUCH
superior!).
Anyway, I tried to talk to as many boatyard repair people as possible
(funny how nobody has any experience with such things but all have
very firm opinions) and the suggestion seemed to be to use Monel
rivets. Sure - if you could find them or afford them if you could! I
even had a guy try to locate them at the Naval Shipyard in Bremerton,
WA - without success. Next best was to use stainless steel rivets,
despite corrosion concerns. Aluminum was deemed too sacrificial.
Bolts were not possible without access into the mast for the nuts,
and screws were deemed likely to pull out. So, stainless rivets it
was - they’re easy to find. I spent hours in the bosun’s chair,
drilling out the aluminum rivets (most of which were loose and some
looked good but were actually broken) and replacing with SS rivets.
The previous owner had uglied the boat significantly with aluminum
mast steps on both masts (yikes!) which made the boat more affordable
(he did some other ugly but non-structural things, too) but I surely
did appreciate them for that project!
Anyway, the old mast-track now attached securely, I fed the
StrongTrak up from the bottom (pre-measured), attached the bottom
with two of their screws, and it works great! The StrongTrak very
evenly distributes sailcar loading across much more of the track and
there’s no way for an errant rivet to block a sailcar. I can now
handpull the main up within a foot of the top now, and when the
halyard is released it all tumbles down nicely into a stack within
the lazylifts. At $25/foot list, it’s also much less expensive than
Harken or any other track replacement solution I looked at, and I
didn’t have to replace the track itself with those fitting hassles.
There’s also virtually no maintenace. My only mild concern is
longevity of the plastic track with years of UV exposure, but so far,
so good. Also, the possible corrosion of the SS rivets - but the soft
aluminum rivets lasted almost 20 years, so I don’t lay awake at night
wondering about it.
That’s my experience.
Tom
Catnip, 1983 F28CC #37
Posted by William A. Cormack (wacormack@…>)
Excellent advice. Thanks
William A. Cormack, CPA
Principal and Chief Financial Officer
Whelan Associates, LLC
Corporate Real Estate Services
Bourne Counting House at One Merrill’s Wharf
New Bedford, MA 02740
Voice: 508-984-4100, Fax: 508-984-4101, Cell 508-254-5828
MailTo:wacormack@…
----- Original Message -----
From: “macks011” <macks04@…>
To: <freedomyachts2003@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Friday, April 23, 2004 4:41 PM
Subject: [freedomyachts2003] Re: Rivet vs machine screw
\
How about bolting an eye strap to the aluminum mast head truck and
attaching a block? Run the halyard to the bow pulpit.
— In freedomyachts2003@yahoogroups.com, “William A. Cormack”
<wacormack@w…> wrote:
I’ll be attaching a block for a flag halyard near the top of my
1986 F-36 mast. Is it OK to drill & tap for 10-24 machine screws
and install with locktite? If rivets are the way to go what amount
of reach is appropriate.
If someone could comment on the reasoning for the choice of
machine screw or rivet I would appreciate it.
Thanks
Bill
William A. Cormack, CPA
Principal and Chief Financial Officer
Whelan Associates, LLC
Corporate Real Estate Services
Bourne Counting House at One Merrill’s Wharf
New Bedford, MA 02740
Voice: 508-984-4100, Fax: 508-984-4101, Cell 508-254-5828
MailTo:wacormack@w…
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