Re: [bolger] Goofball question on mast boot

Interesting problem Gary. I use minicell foam a lot in my kayaks - it's a closed cell foam, but has a lot of 'give' in it and doesn't cost very much. I wonder if squashing a lump of that in the hole would do the trick?

Bill

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Okay, here's the problem. the 7.5 inch square mast on the 30-footer
is mounted in a large tabernacle, the sides of which are about 4.5
inches thick. On the port side of the tabernacle is a cheeck block
for the halyard, which runs back to the cockpit. On the aft and
starboard sides are cleats for the lazy jacks, spare halyard, boom
downhaul, etc. Onthe forward side, a hatch butts up against the mast.
Removing the hatch allowes the mast to be pivoted down. Between the
aft side of the mast the the tabernacle wall is about a one inch gap.

The question is, how to make an effective mast boot for all this.
Just wrapping marine vinyl around the mast and tabernacle doesn't
work because it interferes with the cheek block & the cleats. I tried
vinyl with cutouts for the cleats and cheek blocks, but it isn't very
effective and doesn't look neat.

My crazy thought is to try some of the closed cell expanding foam
found at the home improvement stores. It should fill the gap at the
aft end of the mast and all the seams at the top and front sides of
the mast & tabernacle, and also where the hatch butts up to the mast.
It's not structural, and should be easy to scrape or sand off when
the mast is lowered and/or for painting. BTW, as far as I can tell,
the mast doesn't move at all in the up position, which could cause
problems with crushing the foam or breaking the seal and causing
leaks.

Any reactions? Thanks.

Gary Blankenship