Mast plug sealing/replacement

I have two masts, one comptip, one standard single sheave. Both have a small amount of water in them that will not drain, and I'm guessing that I need to pop both heads off and reseal/replace the plug and the seat on top of the plug, seal with 3M 5200.

Apparently rain water is getting into these masts, I'm guessing that I will punch my ticket to turtle town in the event of a capsize.

So, a few questions:

Differences in anatomy of single sheave and comptip at the mast head?

Any surprises during the removal process, or is it as simple as drilling out 2 rivets and prying?

Do I need to order a new plug and seat, or can I reseal the old one?

Is the hobie pylon/mast plug part number 1060000 the correct plug?

If anyone has a "oh, man...whatever you do, don't do ____________" bits of advice! please share

I always appreciate the help in this forum, I have rescued 3 14's and counting...

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85 Hobie 14 "mello yello"

Too funny! My daughter got her ticket punched not long after we bought her 14....before we realized that the mast weighed like a metric ton or something.

There's a plug/seal near the bottom of the mast, too, so I'd recommend that you at least inspect both. If you can poke it pretty hard without it moving, you might get by with just cleaning/resealing the bottom one? My 14 mast (all aluminum) had a lot of mud with the water, so I'd recommend you remove the top plug/seal and give the mast a good cleaning inside. You'll probably get recommendations against 5200....it's sort of permanent. MBounds has recommended Slikaflex (stays more flexible?). I just used a good quality silicone, and it has seemed to work fine. From my experience with my 16 comp-tip mast, I don't think there will be any difference between the two in regard to removal/replacement of the masthead. Mine came off easily after drilling off the rivet heads and punching the shafts through. All the plugs/seals I've seen came out in good shape to be reused after a good cleaning. They had just come unsealed/loose. In fact the top one on our 14 was several feet down from the head. I screwed a piece of coat hanger (bent in a helical shape) to the end of a broomstick to make a giant corkscrew removal tool. I never got a straight answer to the part number issue....the 16 plug has to be larger than the 14, right? Maybe MMiller will chime in.

Hope this helps. Please let us know how it goes and what you learn. Good luck!

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Jerome Vaughan
Hobie 16

I'm starting with the non-comptip.

Drilled out rivets, plug and seat were in tact, very well sealed. I drilled a small hole to drain the water...there was a fair amount of water in the mast. There was no other way to drain the mast.

The boat has been stored with the mast on trailer, tang up for 6 mos and we have had a ton of rain in TX. I'm guessing that water is getting in through the tang and halyard catcher. Keep in mind that this boat has only been sailed 9 or 10 times in its entire life. Previous owner never did any additional silicone sealing at the fittings.

I am going to fill the hole in the mast plug, re-rivet the single sheave head, seal the firtings and see how it goes. By process of elimination, if there are further issues it must be the base, which I can fix with the same method.

I have the correct stainless rivets, I'm off to harbor freight in search of an inexpensive rivet gun. Hopefully I'm able to pop the stainless rivets by hand.

Upon inspection, again, it appeared that the top seal was in tact. I should have sealed fittings over the winter...is it possible that rain water could be sucked in through the fittings? Could this be old water from prev owner?

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85 Hobie 14 "mello yello"