Has anybody else noticed that there is a dearth of spars in the world, or at least the UK?
It's all very well if you get a kick out of hunting down amazing costly conifers, then doing shapely little things to them, but for the likes of myself who just want to get the canvas, well alright then terylene, up there without buying a whole production racing dinghy previously fitted underneath it, it's a bind.
For a long time I was working on a several hundred mile beach in the Middle East and as I boat-built my way through my time there, I reckoned that spars were going to be a real problem, but no. Installed in the Royal Navy of Oman, I found all sorts of goodies from the drifting lifeboats (empty ones) and such that the naval vessels frequently bought back to the base, as a hazard to navigation and more from the sailing centre. Here personnel under training had conveniently capsized Lasers, Toppers and other craft in shallow water providing a steady supply of anodised aluminium tubing with variously bent ends. A magnificent supply line for small luggers and such.
Infact 'Tit Willow's mast is from a lifeboat - mostly delaminated into two pieces in the sun and too narrow at the top, so I stuck the laminations back together and wrapped the top yard or two in a couple of layers of epoxied glass cloth. It is still good twelve years later. Her boom was the original bermudan mast (cut down) from 'Rosie Mae's rig when I got her and the gaff came from the mizzen spar of a lateen rigged Soling; yes, a lateen rigged Soling. In turn, 'Rosie Mae's mast is the loom of a lifeboat oar, her boom is from a Topper and the lug from a windsurfer mast. Then there was another baby lugger in between and a chum found enough for a gaff ketch from the same sources.
Back here in Arundel a lady member of the Arundel Boat Club found that she wasn't really strong enough to lift her Foxer rig into place, (it works on a sleeve and into a hole like the Laser). So I had Arun Sails chop the top off, in the shape of a standing lug and for want of something more appropriate, I laced it to an old length of TV aerial mast. The rest of that tube was, you guessed it - slightly bent, so it ended up as the top end of my mock-up Yuloh. The Foxer lug works well, but the spar is sufficiently heavy to cause the crew some concerns when being lowered; the lady would like something lighter. For my part, as usual I have a lugger, or two in mind myself.
Now we can cut to the chase; I really cannot find any good source of tubing for spars. When I was little, sailing clubs always had racks of old, damaged bits and pieces. What happened, are there bent tube bandits out there and a whole black market for broken dinghy spars? Proctor, it seems is now Selden Spars, though they don't seem to work between bank holidays; I have looked on line and trying to find a source of anodised aluminium spar tubing, or GRP, or even carbon fibre tubing is fraught with people who don't have a clue what I am talking about and only sell wholesale anyway.
I have one quote for a carbon fibre tube, (32 mm ID - any good??), 2.5 metres at around £75; frankly, I don't think the present tube is anything like £75 dangerous on a reasonably second hand boat.
I suppose it's really that my ageing grey matter cannot keep up with the actual cost of boating these days, but does anybody have any better suggestions?
The ancient and marinated Chris W
Locked
