What do you guys think about fixing, with rivets, a swivel cam block on an Inter 20 carbon mast to raise the spi? Is, in your opinion, the structure of the mast strong enough to sustain the stress of the sail?
Thanks in advance.
I did this on my NACRA F-18.... that is put the swivel cam the mast the same way the Infusion had it set up... Went back to the old set up as I believe we had better leverage on the halyard when hoisting in a heavy wind.
As for the carbon mast, I had converted the mast base over to the Infusion base because the holes for the mast rotation system we becoming elongated and deteriorating.
I'd be nervous about the load that swivel cam would put on the rivets into unreinforced carbon. If you can get inside and use washers for the rivets(or screws and nuts), that'd be much better. Particularly if you could bed the washers with thickened epoxy or something similar.
My rotation system was doing the same thing - oblonging one of the post holes on one side. I have a plate with two screws about an inch apart on the inside with the two screws through the mast. One that had a nut on it and the other that the rotator was on with a nut. I moved the rotator to the other screw post. Hopefully it will hold till the end of the season at which time I'll have to remove the mast base to get access.
My point is that if you want to do rivets, or screws, I would definitely put them into something other than just the mast. A bent piece of metal glued to the inside would help greatly in displacing the load.