boom broke!

E

emilypaige19

New Member
I went sailing the other day with a couple of friends on my sunfish and my lower spar/boom snapped in half (freak accident!), then the goose neck slipped off of the boom. Thankfully we got to shore safely but now i don't know what to do about my sail. I dont want to spend too much money on a new sail..my sunfish is pretty old. i was hoping to be up a running by this weekend too!

Do you think its a bad idea to replace my boom with a PVC pipe?
Does anyone have other suggestions for fixing my problem?

Thanks!
 
sunfish direct=lower boom with blocks $185 , seeing a sunfish a'sailing with a noodly/bendy/soon to snap piece of pvc......priceless ! just kiddin . Bet you could find used spars cheap with a little diggin. Anyone out there with some cheap used spars ?
 
The original Sailfish/Sunfish long ago came with wooden spars. A PVC pipe is heavier than the aluminum and would never do the job.

surfski if right. I'd bet you could find some used spars lying around. I've got some used spars that I could part with for about 40 bucks. I purchased a couple of new uppers from John Sayre last year, and I think they run about 90 bucks.

It doesn't have to be a lower spar. An upper can be converted.

Hopefully, you still have the pieces / blocks.
 
One other idea. Get 18-24" of PVC pipe in a diameter just larger than your boom. Cut a slot in it lengthwise zo when you compress the tube you can slide it into the boom. It will them spring open a bit to hold itself in place. You' d slide 12" into one piece of boom and 12" into the other. Now your boom is back in one piece. Drill holes thru the boom and either screw, bolt or pop rivet the PVC so it cannot slide. Next, you will want to remove the eyepads and blocks and remount them so the boom
is end for end (ie the goosenck goes on the solid part of what usd to be near the end of the boom and the repaired parr is now at the end of the boom where there is less strain. Good luck. BB
 
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