Just had my first outing for a couple of months and wanted to try out some mod’s that I made over winter. I never really thought about a barber hauler or a boom until I saw ‘rokraiders’ design. I always thought that they were just another bit of useless gear that will just get in the way of more important gear at a critical moment.
Last Sunday was sunny and 5-10knots which was ideal conditions to test it out and I must say it proved to be a bit of kit that will now be standard on my AI as it finished up doing more than expected.
Please forgive the poor video. This was my very first attempt at installing the new flexi-boom so trying to hold the camera while inserting the female ends of the boom onto the male shafts was a bit of a struggle ( and I can’t be bothered going through the video editing palaver ).
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVrLIBqztsc[/youtube]
The design uses a fibreglass tent pole kit and one of those ‘S’ shaped hooks ( what do you call them? ) attached to the sail. At the mast end I fabricated up a Stauff bracket ( from most hydraulic stores ) with a cut down bolt welded to the back plate. I assembled 3 of the poles with the bungee shock cord up the middle and ended the poles with females connectors at both ends. The Stauff bracket is positioned around the mast just below the bottom of the sail with the bar pointing out in line with the sail. And that’s it. Although some rope attachments would pull the sail down slightly, it wasn’t really needed and I found that because I was only in low wind conditions and furling wasn’t going to be required until I came back to shore, I finished up leaving it attached and still using it whilst tacking. When it’s not required, you can either collapse it to 1/3 the length ( just like tent poles ) and stick it in the fishing rod holes in the hull, or attach an aluminium clip to the pole and clip it to the Aka pin bungee as I have done in the video clip. If anyone is interested in pole diameter and lengths please reply and I’ll measure as I can’t remember the sizes off the top of my head but I found that the poles I chose were spot on for flexibility.
Thanks ‘rokraider’ for the initial design idea which you may have pinched from someone else in true Hobie fashion.
Question: To all you sailing tech heads. What is the true definition of this ? Is it a barber hauler or boom or something else ?
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Don't take life too seriously................it ain't permanent.