I finally broke it! Mea Culpa, Mea Culpa, Mea Maxima Culpa!

[Norman_E]

Some may remember that I described fitting bronze bushes into the gooseneck on my yacht because the soft casting had suffered serious wear. I noticed at the time that the metal seemed to be poor stuff, as it was very soft. Today a 35 knot gust of wind and a moments inattention produced a broach towards a rocky shoreline so that I was forced to continue the turn ending with a gybe that finished off the casting. The break has revealed the horribly crystalline internal structure of the metal. I now have the gooseneck held together with a rope lashing so I will just have to avoid any gybes for the rest of this cruise.

I will make the new gooseneck from an aluminium alloy billet.

P.S. The gust was a real surprise. I had been going downwind in between 15 and 20 knots, and had turned a bit so that the apparent wind was just about on the beam. A small increase in wind speed had given me over 9 knots on the GPS, but had been dying away when the big gust arrived. The inattention was that having tacked so that the genoa was back-winded and I was parallel to the shore, albeit going in the wrong direction, I should have centred the boom and put the Scott Boomlock on before continuing the turn. The big gust had ended, but a second one hit just as I gybed.

EDIT: I remember that last year I was in the office of a charter company that has several yachts with the same Sparcraft rig as mine. On the manager's desk was a broken gooseneck casting. He told me it was not their first broken one, and that they had replacements made from stainless steel rather than wait for delivery of original cast ones from France.

 

[Norman_E]

Gooseneck Update

I sailed yesterday in some strong winds with the boom tied on with a rope lashing. On a beam reach across the big bay outside Fethiye and Gocek I had an unofficial race with a new chined hull Jeanneau 42 in winds of 20+ knots. I started chasing it from well behind and over a 5 mile run at speeds that averaged about 7.5 knots and reached almost 9 at times I passed it, and the other crew were definitely trying. Interestingly I found that as I effectively sail single handed I use the autopilot a lot, but hand steering I gained on the other yacht faster than I did on autopilot. After that run and a beat upwind I found that the lashing had loosened a bit, and became concerned that the strain on the vang fitting might be too great to continue sailing that way for the next three weeks. Today I am in Gocek and have been by bus to Fethiye to get a workshop in the Saniye there to make me a temporary fitting from a piece of aluminium bar. I will fit it tomorrow.