If you are going to do epoxy work this winter, make sure you keep your garage (or basement) warm enough. If not the epoxy will take forever to cure.

I would say that beofre you spend time and money doing repairs, if you have all the components needed get out and sail first. You will find any other little things that need to be fixed and once you get on the water you will be motivated to get the repairs done.

That photo doesn't look like any H-16 mast I have ever seen. My boat is an '82 so maybe earlier ones had a different setup. You are definitely missing something.

NUTS!

I LOVE your idea of sailing this year before doing any work. I know from the work I did on our Sunbird that you are right. I will find plenty of problems as I SAIL that I will only guess about before that. BUT it sounds like the sailing season may be ending up here.

SIGH. I know about temperature and humidity for most repairs. So I will take a look at things and clean them up if we get a clean dry day. Then I will inspect the hulls closely and MAYBE do the preliminary compounding so I can see what kind of shape the hulls are in. Possibly get the West System repairs going one scratches and gouges. Also inventory all of the blocks. I know there are a couple of sheaves that have totally deteriorated, but the big sheet systems all seem to be in excellent shape. I will know tomorrow if I have the real mast. That may get me more ready to take it out regardless of what seems sensible....

THIS IS AN AWESOME FORUM!

Richard

Things are now cleared up. I HAVE the proper mast, and the boatless mast has been returned. Now it is clear how the mast fits the step, but I am definitely thinking I will need one those mast step links.

THANKS again. This trip it was easy to spot the proper mast and now I am ready to sail IF there is a nice day before we wind up closing up for the winter.

Richard

Well! Glad you found it!

You might want to find out what you can use to correctly clean sails. Depending on color you can bleach white dacron sails and they clean up well- don't use laundry soap- it weakens fabric- I learned this years ago- isn't it still true?

John R.

I am sure that a mast step link is a great help when steping solo, but I spent all summer steping masts on hobies and flying scotts without step links, just having one person to "kick" the foot of the mast, holding it on the step, and one or two people to "throw" the mast up and hold it untill the kicker can go and attach the forestay, it also works coming down but the kicker needs to be a little bigger then.