If your old masts are proctors regardless of the section you may be better off re-rigging them, as new masts are about $1200. Dave White remains the only one to get them lately, ooo- and Mark Matthews too. But I dunno if Mark can get more, you will have to check with him.

As for booms, I am afriad it is 1-800-call-a-pomme. Dave or Mark should be able to help to sort you out.

And this is why there is also very little available in used spars - we sail 'em until they break. Its an expensive proposition to get your hands on a new mast simply for the sake of upgrading your equipment.

Here is what we did last year and you can take it from there. We ordered two masts, Proctor Stratus II's and two booms rigged with de-rakers for $2,200 from Ian Pinnell. We used a Visa card to pay for them and they were shipped to us in about four to six weeks. When the masts came in we placed the entire package in overhead storage as we did not need them right away and when we went to get them out it was discovered they were bent. Our problem ended up being that we waited until we needed the masts and booms before inspecting them for damage. After 15 days the carrier is no longer responsible for damages and there isn't much anyone can do to correct the situation. On top of that although the price looks good at $1,100.00 per mast and boom we did not figure the import taxes and the overland shipping it would take to get the masts from New York to Pittsburgh via a truck. The total cost of that bill was around $500.00. and we had problems as the pieces were damaged and our school did not want to pay for damaged goods but we were somewhat to fault as we did not inspect the items right away. During the summer I talked to APS in Annapolis and they informed me they get their Proctor products from Dave Ullman in California and suggested I ask them about future purchases. Dave informed me he has Proctor Epslawn sections which are similar to the Stratus II sections but are stiffer sections and according to him that is what the west coast sailors are using. He said he could get the Stratus II sections in but we would have to wait several months to get them. The advantage with going with Dave is we avoid the duty taxes and the hassels of dealing with the government and those goofy clearing houses. The down side is Dave does all that and he passes the cost of to the customer. No matter which way you go the masts can be had and If you want Andrew Davies can supply you with a list of suppliers from England who will sell you Proctor products but you will have to deal with buying something with US dollars and the conversion factor of converting US dollars to British pounds come to play and there is the problem of dealing with the customs and duty procedures and the final delivery of the item to wherever it is going. All this can be costly. Hope this helps. We will be getting our next mast from Dave Ullman and not be going through a British company just for the ease of dealing with a US supplier.

I had the number but misplaced it. How I got was I called Annapolis Performance Sailing 1-800-729-9767. They order all their proctor spinnaker poles that they sell from Dave and they gave me his 800 number. He even sent me a catalog but as I said I misplaced this stuff and I will just make a couple of calls to get the stuff sent to me again. Hope this helps.

(…a Super Spars M7 mast with a 'slight' bend from side to side. It starts just above the spreaders and is about 1 inch/25 mm out at the top)

If the mast is not "kinked", then it might be salvageable by "gently" trying to straighten it up. This can be done by putting the mast where the bend starts between a couple of firm, but well padded supports, and then using the lever principle to encourage it back into place. One has to proceed very slowly, so as not to induce a kink in the mast. It likely won't come back to dead straight, but might be good enough for most club sailing. If the price is right for the mast as it is, go for it. (For anyone old enough to remember, there was a cartoon in an old Proctor Spars handbook about straightening masts up, using and elephant and a couple of trees!)

We used trailer ratchet straps to bend M7 Masts back. We put the mast against a tyre (solid but not to hard) and pulled slowly with the straps. You have to do this repeatedly and slow avoiding any bumps!!! As you will never get it back bang straight, use different holes for the shrouds and maybe you have to pull the mast on one side at the mast gate. Check with full rig tension on the sideways bend looking from the gooseneck to the top. It's most important that this is straight. I don't know what side effects bending back a mast have. You won't probably become a World champion with that, but if worried about you have to buy new gear Cheers, have fun.

I checked through my files and found a Proctor Canada shop drawing that provides all the dimensions for a Fireball mast fit-up (irregardless of section). The centre of the spreader bracket should be located at 3100 mm above the top of the mast tenon. Make sure you are really clear on what is meant by 'top of tenon' before you start drilling.

With typical luck, the old holes will be too close to the desired location for the new holes. In this case you can sleeve the mast in this area.

As a general rule, spreader location can be determined using one of the following:

- locate them at 62.5% of the distance between the deck and the hounds (measuring up from the deck)

- locate the spreaders at the point of maximum deflection of the mast (which should be between 55% and 65% of the first distance.

- take the mainsail you are going to use, lay it on the ground, fold the luff over so you have a straight leading edge and find the point of maximum luff curve. The spreaders should be attached at this point on the mast.

Obviously, this last method will change depending upon which sail cut you are using. Since most of us don't have separate sail/mast combinations, we, by necessity end up with a compromise location for the spreaders.

In general, this is not really detrimental, since we have a number of other adjustments that can be made to alter the amount of bend on the mast.

Finally, one word of caution, from an engineering standpoint, it is not a good idea to start moving your spreaders up and down the mast (and by default, drilling holes in the mast tube to attach the spreader bracket.)The more holes that are put into the mast in the area of the spreader bracket is an open invitation to pre-mature mast failure.

Another option would be to get an external sleeve to go around the mast at the spreader location point. If the sleeve is long enough (at least 6-8") there should be enough support to attach the spreaders and not further weaken the mast. Stef's suggestion of moving the spreaders will work as well, just make sure you don't relocate the spreaders to a new location that was close (within 2-3") of the previous location. Too many holes in the mast at that location is good way of breaking a mast. (But then, if you have your insurance paid up, it might be a good way to get a new stick out of the deal!)

Yeah, not even vaseline will help you with that one. Maybe if you somehow lower the washer through the mast... pretty tricky operation requiring several bubbly beverages.

Or just fill the hole with JB Weld, let it harden, and redrill for the new rivet.

I've used 6:1 in the past (a pair of Harken triple microblocks) - you have to hang a V-cleat from the becket of the upper triple block. The drawback to this system is getting the two sides exactly symmetrical. As well, fireball class rules specify that the shrouds must terminate at the chainplates or some such thing - the bottom line is that you can't bring the adjusting lines into the cockpit to cleat them - the cleat must be integral with the set of blocks that you use. On my current boat I just went back to chainplates (well, the easily adjustable 'de-raker' style). Simple is good. I believe Henry McCray uses an 8:1 arrangement - a wire single-block cascading to a pair of double-blocks. Be sure that all the lines, blocks, and cleats are up to the high working loads that the rig will see (the 600 pound static rig tension that you might load the rig up to is only the starting point - what's the load on the shroud when you get hit by a really big puff?)

Yup. You can actually find a really cool number that swages on to your shroud and in addition has a little loop on it that you can splice a vectrus/spectron/technora line to for the trapeze.

There is a clam cleat that you can but that has a small roller in it. The Cleat is shackled to the end of the trapeze below the handle. A piece of line is dead ended on the cleat and runs down through the dogbone which also has a block on it. It then goes up through the roller on the cleat and is tied off. You need a piece of shock cord attached to the dogbone at some point and run down through the cockpit (in front of the mast or along the edges) and to the dogbone on the other side. Hope this helps.