TIMBER!

Or why we had to pull the stick for more reasons than one

In the beginning, we thought our Masthead adventure would consist of nothing more than a matshead stay pin removal and exchange. While most boatowners do not have to contend with removing plain steel pins from their mast heads that had been placed there as inferior substitutes for the stainless variety, we had bought a Prout Catamaran. Thus, we should have expected trouble with our rigging. After all, we've had trouble with just about every other system on board.

Our initial hints of trouble were the rust streaks running down the mast head housing (see top left image). Evidently, the stainless pins that ZSpar had furnished had been substituted with something else. Since Prout Catamarans had stepped the mast for us in the USA, it was clear who was responsible. However, why limit yourself to pins? Thus, Prout Catamarans also decided to marry 3/4" stay terminals to 5/8" pins. Thus, instead of having a real bearing surface, the terminals experienced a point load - with predictable results (top right picture).

In other words: We are damn lucky that the rig did not collapse on us. This is the story how we fixed it.