PVC and fiberglasss mast?

[Jeff Horton]

Just thinking out loud here. But has anyone looked at taking a PVC pipe and coating it with fiberglass or carbon fiber to make a mast?  Just curious.

[JeffM]

Don't know.  I do know that epoxy doesn't stick well to pvc.  I'm guessing that the result would be significantly heavier than the recommended aluminum for the same strength.  There was a thread within the last year started by a guy who sells simple kits for making carbon fiber/epoxy masts.  Not to complicated to do, if I remember right, but not too cheap, either.

[Greg Luckett]

Having played around with pvc and epoxy resin and cloth, my opinion is that the fiber glass will shear off of the pvc pipe.  This will leave the pipe to slide inside the hardened fiberglass tube.  Expansion and contraction forces would be a problem too.

On Sam's and Ben's boat, the Amphora "Dragon", we used 2" sch.40 PVC.  Since the experiment with the fiberglass did not do well, we did not try glassing the spars, but instead we inserted 2x2 pressure treated wood to stiffen the mast.  It did make it a lot heavier, of course.   We are on the lookout for some sch.80 pvc to try next.

[ChrisObee]

Try this site

http://www.lmorocz.com/BoatBuilding/mast01.htm

[Jeff Horton]

Thanks. I wasn't interested in trying it so much as just curious why no one else had. That pretty much answers my questions.

If I try something foolish it will be a wood mast.    I searched and read everything on this forum about wood masts and have decided it is just not the way to go. But part of me still wants too.  

Maybe I will veneer the aluminum. LOL