Sport Today

I am ready to get rid of my old alum mast, and get
nice light carbon mast.

My north sails should have a flex top, relatively stiff mast.

Any recommendations on a light, reliable, carbon flex top?
1 piece is preferred, but 2 pieces is acceptable.

I am also thinking of a new boom, in particular the fleetwood
with the oblong grip. Any comments?

Try the North masts. They have a good carbon mast which has black pigment
on the top layer to help protect the carbon from UV. I use an alloy bottom
with carbon top. This gives stiffness, strength at the boom area and
the carbon weight advantage. Ideally a 1-piece is better. I believe
Fibrespars' should rig OK.

Cant say on that one, I haven't seen it. Again North make a good boom
and so do many others eg. Chinook, Fleetwood, etc.

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Australian Graduate School of Management,       Tel: 61 2 931 9263
P.O. Box 1, Kensington. N.S.W. 2033.            Fax: 61 2 662 7621

I heard a rumor that Fiberspar is working on a North-specific line of
carbon masts. Their "red" masts apparently do not match North's flex
charasteristics.

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  Juri Munkki                                          Windsurf: fast sailing

        I have a great deal for you!  I have two brand new Fiberspar
        2-pc Performance Carbon 460/28 FlexTop masts for sail.
        $200 ea.  These weigh in at 5.2 lbs.  Let me know.

        None for sale, but I use one and love it.  Very stiff,
        lighter than aluminum, great feel.

No kidding, since red is the constant flex and Norths need flex top (at least
Prismas do).  I think the Fiberspar catalog says to use a long blue label mast
with North Prismas (use a 460 even though you could use a 440) or something
like that, (maybe it was the other way around).

-Jonathan

Oops. My mistake. I guess I remembered the colors wrong. I meant to say "blue".

Anyway, even North masts may not work correctly with all North sails. I'm
not happy with how a 5.0 Infinity rigs with a Dynamic speed base and an
epoxy 220 cm top. The base is too stiff and the top is too flexible. A
wave tech base works much better, even though it's not really recommended
for slalom sails.

All Norths need flex tops, but it seems to me that the tops can no longer flex
quite as much as they used to. The dynamic speed/epoxy combination worked
quite well with an older Infinity (1989).

Currently my "best mast" in terms to flex curve compatibility with the
new sails is an old single piece North Heavy Duty Wave that used to be
465 cm, but that has been cut to 440 cm by taking a few cm from the
base and some more from the top. My 1991 Gamma 5.5 rigs really nicely
on that mast and gives amazing range of working downhaul adjustment.

Cutting the top has made the mast more constant curve and stiffer, so
the sail rigs a little flatter than on more flex top masts.

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  Juri Munkki                                          Windsurf: fast sailing