Blew a shroud today need a question answered

in about 15-20 kts of wind we were flying along them bam mast is on its side resting on the wing seat.....we were upwind of where we needed to be and were able to sail with the jib as a spinnaker. The shroud that snaped was set to be replaced after todays sail...oh well one sail too late...

luckily nothing else broke....amazingly actually

WELL DONE HOBIE!

The thing that bothered me though was not a single boat stoped and asked us if we were alright and it was a busy day on the bay.


Noticed something was wrong...the is a small crack in the comptip near the base...here are so photos need some advise on whether or not it needs to be replaced

Without peeling things back, the comptip damage looks pretty superficial. Most of those kinds of cracks we've repaired have been.

If you want to repair it, Gray Marine Tex is your friend. Otherwise, just trim some of the sharp edges and go sailing (after you fix the shroud. )

Brian C

I expected breaking a shroud to be more violent but it actually wasn't bad. The wing seat kept the mast from going all the way into the water...i dont know if the mast laying on its side for the 10 minute sail in is bad or not...but it kept the mast out of the water and enabled us to sail downwid with the jib

How old is your boat?

Brian C

2006 it gets used a good 4+ times a week during the summer...It's about 13 months old.

Just wondering... We used to get some stuff from Hobie for sticking the mast together that was kind of elastic. It would have explained the boo-boos in the mast.

The mast came down slow because it had that nice parachute slowing the descent.

Brian C

ahh that makes sense now that i think about it...it was sheeted in all the way when it happened.

We're going to the hobie dealer tomorrow to have them take a look at it...unfortunately they're about 45 miles away...but great to do business with


one part of the story i didnt tell was dad sailed it in downwind...as we approached the beach he turned the boat directly into the beach which put the mast pointin directly into the wind...the wind picked up the mast...caught tension on the other shroud and nearly "turtled" the boat on the beach but luckily some uys saw what was going on and we we all able to keep the boat from falling over onto the mast

this thing can take some serious abuse...

it raises the other question though....how much wind was the Getaway designed to deal with? Sometimes I feel like our abilities now after nearly sailing it nearly everyday for 2 summers are more then what the boat was designed for.

The CompTip crack is cosmetic. Is the comptip glued it to the mast? I looks like it is seated too tightly to the aluminum. It is compressing the putty material and chipping it. If not glued... get it glued in. There should be a small gap between the comptip and aluminum extrusion.

The shroud failure may be more of an accelerated wear issue. The number one cause of this type of problem is mooring your boat... I would hope the boat is on a beach and not sitting in the water as water motion combined with wind is very damaging to the rig. If the mast is left up at all times and the mast rotates freely, you are tweaking the shroud on every rotation. I would look at a way of restricting the masts rotation on the beach.

_________________
Matt Miller
Former - Director of Parts and Accessory Sales
Warranty and Technical Support
Hobie Cat USA
(Retired 11/7/2022)

we went back to the dealer to have them look at it today.

We trailer our boat...The comptip is glued in at least thats what we were told today...I remember him saying we can't pull the comptip out of the aluminum to check for more extensive damage..

...when we bought it the rubber gasket putty seal was there....however it peeled out when we started using the trapeze..the woman at the dealer told us this was normal when we asked about it...she said ..sometimes some extra will come out and crack off.

The shroud failure was due to the fact that we didn't check to see if they were all lined up at the mast tang prior to raising the mast i figured this one out on my own..it bent at the tang.....lesson learned.

The glue may have been too soft and allowed it to slip down. We also saw a change in this joint when a new tool was made for molding the CompTips. There use to be a radius that would wedge into the aluminum before the two surfaces could meet. That prevented the putty material from chipping. I would probably place a few rivets in it to stabilize the position. Then grind away a little groove around the whole thing to relieve the pressure against the putty.

_________________
Matt Miller
Former - Director of Parts and Accessory Sales
Warranty and Technical Support
Hobie Cat USA
(Retired 11/7/2022)

what does this putty do?

The core and main structure is a tube of wrapped fiberglass. The black coating (putty / gelcoat) gives it the smooth finish and contours. The luff track grooves etc are all solid putty material.

_________________
Matt Miller
Former - Director of Parts and Accessory Sales
Warranty and Technical Support
Hobie Cat USA
(Retired 11/7/2022)