Ouch is right :) That was about a $500 lesson, but who knows how much longer a 44-year old extruded plastic luff support system would have lasted anyway. It had some other visible deterioration. But probably not as expensive a lesson as replacing a carbon fiber spin pole :)
Cheers, Randy ----- Original Message ----- From: "Sam Wheeler via CnC-List" <[email protected]> To: "cnc-list" <[email protected]> Cc: "Sam Wheeler" <[email protected]> Sent: Tuesday, May 24, 2016 4:38:50 PM Subject: Re: Stus-List Head Foil Feed Funnel Ouch. My version of Lesson 1 was when I was in college and an older alumnus invited our team to race with him on his Serendipity 43. We went out for a practice day, and as team captain and one of the only people with non-dinghy race experience, I ended up as the de facto crew chief. We get the spinnaker up and call for a jibe. Foredeck crew dips the pole and gets it hooked up on the new guy, but it's not coming aft, so I yell to the 6'8" dude on the primary winch to keep cranking. The ensuing explosion of carbon fiber shards taught me a valuable lesson about baby stays. Sam 35-3 SF On Mon, May 23, 2016 at 9:13 PM, Randy Stafford via CnC-List < [email protected] > wrote: It's in 18 feet of murky questionable marina water that I'd prefer not to swim in, even if I could see my hand in front of my face :) Turns out I got great customer service from Head Foil. I sent them a picture and description of the half I didn't drop overboard, and they dated it to the first years of their company - early 70s, meaning my luff support system was probably original. They looked but couldn't find a replacement part. So I'm getting a new Head Foil system after a 44-year service life on the previous one. Not sure the replacement feed funnel have would have been a complete fix anyway, because some of the plastic extrusion underneath it cracked and broke off. Without a new system I'm worried that sharp plastic edges might cut luff tapes of headsails being hoisted. The new Head Foil system is significantly less expensive than competing systems or furlers. I called / emailed the company on Saturday morning and they called me back within a few hours. My new system shipped today. I'll report back after installing and using it. There's actually more to the story. Went out for a leisure sail with family, and the genoa foot fouled on a horn cleat during the hoist. My daughter's boyfriend (big strong kid) kept hauling on the halyard until the feed funnel blew apart. Both halves were still dangling by one of two screws holding them together (the other screw blew out somewhere during the hoist). When we got back to the marina I went to take all the parts off the forestay to see if I could find replacement screws and re-assemble the whole thing, and that's when I dropped the part overboard. But I'm not sure reassembly would have worked anyway because of the broken plastic. The lessons: (1) if a sail is not going up like you expect, something is wrong, and continuing to haul on the halyard will only break something; (2) be careful not to drop shit overboard :) Cheers, Randy _______________________________________________ This list is supported by the generous donations of our members. If you like what we do, please help us pay for our costs by donating. All Contributions are greatly appreciated!
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