Sails Away

In a new installment in a series on refitting a classic-plastic Pearson 36, the focus shifts to the sails and rigging. THE SNOEK CHRONICLES BY ONNE VAN DER WAL

Mast, rigging and sails all get a face-lift in an old Pearson revamp.

Between fall 2015 and summer 2016, I conducted a major refit of a Pearson 36 named Snoek after a fish I used to catch while growing up in South Africa (see “The Snoek Chronicles, Hands-on Sailor 2017; “Plumb Crazy,” April 2017; and “Deck, Mate,” June/july 2017). My first article was an overview of the project; the second focused on plumbing; the third on deck layouts. Going forward, I’ll delve into other parts of the boat to present a detailed record of the work involved. This month, we’ll take a better look at the sails and rigging. Here is what the mast looked like when I pulled it out of the boat (top left). You can see the horrendous corrosion going on. I decided to cut 3 or 4 inches off the bottom — it looked like the dog had been eating it. Then I had the problem of how to fix it. I solved the problem with a couple of pieces of a material called G10, a bulletproof fiberglass-and-epoxy laminate that I had professionally cut on a laser cutter. I gave the guys a portion of the extrusion that I cut off the mast to use as a template. The idea was to have one section that would fit inside the mast and another on which the mast would sit. I epoxied the two pieces together, then drilled and tapped them to make a single platform (right). Once the mast was re-stepped, you could see how much I’d shortened it. I also ended up drilling some holes in the fiberglass insert so it could drain any water that got down there (above left). Now we’ll never have those corrosion problems again.