Fixing a broken mast base

gregcrawford · Post by **gregcrawford** » Sat Nov 21, 2009 6:22 pm

My C22 mast base was broken where you place the pin when raising the mast. I was going to cast a new one, but my furnace is down right now. So I thought I would fabricate a stainless "horse shoe" to take care of it in the mean time. Link to pictures below. Pay no attention to the date on the pictures- I haven't reset the camera after changing batteries. All this was done today. I used 1/8" 304L stainless that I purchased from Online Metals. I had to rip it to 7/8" on a bandsaw as it was too wide. I drilled 1/8" holes to mark everything and then bent the strap. Bending after the larger holes are drilled would make too sharp a bend at the holes, especially the 11/16". I punched the mast base, drilled and tapped 1/4-20 holes in four places. It is very stout as an assembly and should do the job.

http://community.webshots.com/user/volcanoe42

Paul the Denverite · Post by **Paul the Denverite** » Sat Nov 21, 2009 10:11 pm

Thanks for sharing the pics. Glad to see I'm not the only one with high tech "nut can" storage technicques. Any plans to fill in the missing aluminum with something like Alumniflux - or whatever it's called?

Alanhod · Post by **Alanhod** » Sat Nov 21, 2009 10:18 pm

Nicely done, thanks for the photo's and the idea should I ever need it.

Thanks
Alan

gregcrawford · Post by **gregcrawford** » Sun Nov 22, 2009 5:00 am

I kind of look at this as a temporary fix (although I may never change it). It took me about an hour and a half to make this strap.

It's been a few years, but I built an electric aluminum melting furnace following Dave Gingery's book and made quite a few aluminum castings. I still have the furnace and the molding sand so when I get around to replacing the burned out electric element, I will cast a couple of new mast bases using modeling clay to fill in the holes on the old one and using it as a plug. The casting sand has a petroleum binder, and reproduces beautifully.

I don't plan on filling in the broken out space at the bottom.

Alanhod · Post by **Alanhod** » Sun Nov 22, 2009 1:23 pm

It's been a long time since I did any aluminum casting. It was surprisingly easy with the right sand and equipment, the results were excellent. I tended to take a bit longer making the sand castings then my teacher was happy with but I had very little clean-up on the final casting because the prep time paid off in the end.

Thanks
Alan

Banshi · Post by **Banshi** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 6:25 am

Mine looks just like that but the pin stays in so I have just left it be, looks nice though. Did you address the dissimilar metal issue? Probably not a short term problem.