TOPIC:

Dirty wrote:

It's really hard to say if a long mast would be an issue like that or not. It depends on the boat and overall setup. The amount of force generated at the boat (moment/torque) would be force (top) * distance. So if if you hit a big wave, with a big board and no line give - lets say it generated the equivalent of a 50lb pulling force (momentarily). On a 15 foot mast, your looking at 750 ft lbs at the boat connection. This is just one example as I am sure forces can easily be higher at times.

I would consider this fairly significant on some boats and a non issue on others. Not necessarily because of the instantaneous stress, but rather fatigue over time. There are also localized shear stresses to take into account.

I would think that 50lb of pulling force might be kind of light. Amish Outfittets recommend 500 lb test line for their plastic boards and stated 200 lb rated line was not enough.

amishoutfitters.com/catalog/index.php?ma..._info&products_id=19

I would guess 100 lb might be more common of a pull of a turn into a wave, which in turn would apply 1500 lb of sideways force to base. Getting a little more dicey at those numbers.

The mast itself would need to substantial to withstand that force.

Consider running the mast low to the water as possible. I have 2 Cisco Electric Planer Board Reels mounted on each side of the hard top which is about 9 feet above the water. I then run the planer board lines to the 2 pullies (mounted near the bow on the left and right sides) mounted on the 1 inch safety rail. These pullies are about 4 feet above the water.
I then run Big Jon Downrigger ball retrievers with about 15 feet of line to pull the Big Board line in, to set fishing lines. This is about 12 feet back from the bow. I do this to keep the planer board lines under the fishing rods. On turns I had the planer board line go under the reels or catch rod eyelets and pull the fishing rod out of the rod holder. Make sure you use a large snubber on your planner boards to reduce impact force. I run my snubber attached at the boards. I have been on 2 Lake Erie Charters where the snubbers are attached at the boat.

The highest mast I have seen was on a charter about 15 feet from the water, mounted on a 32 foot boat (Grady White) hard top. The captain did this in case of a hard turn (emergency) allowing the planer board lines to go over all the rods in the back of the boat.

Bruce

Lickety-Split wrote:

Mike what did you use to extend yout mast out to the sides? I understand what you mean. If you extend the T bar to the out side area of the boat, decreases the pinch point by having the mast centered on a turn. The mast line wants to go over your head and touch up against rods. So by extending the mast T to the sides helps eliminate mast lines traveling over head at angle on turns, also helping keep them from rods. So the only other way to eliminated the issue other then extending the T length is to increase the mast length.

We fished the mast system with big boards during the summer and had no issues fishing long copper of lead core this way.

Had always dragged small walleye boards before but really like working with the big board mast system. Its like anything else when you get used to it everything becomes easier to manage. Also can fish much lighter rods and enjoy the fish alittle more.

Thank you for a good explanation of what is probably the best solution to the issues. In my opinion tall masts are not the way to go. I could just see someone thinking it's easier to go higher and end up potentially causing damage. Our past time we all love and enjoy is already expensive no need to create any unnecessary damage.

that and bending! lol

Anyone out there have an extremely long mast? If so what is the experience and what are the mast spec's and boat connection?

I build mine 5 foot tall. All of the ones that can be bought look to have a 6 foot tall double mast on from what I can tell aluminum shaft.
Wish brother nature would chime in as I know he uses them and has experience with them. If I remember right, he has two aluminum poles about four foot long that he attaches to the very front of his bow.

I’m not an engineer, but I’ve been home building “stuff” all my life because it is fun and often less expensive. I made a motorbike out of a bicycle and lawnmower engine in shop class when I was an eighth grader. My first downriggers used golf cart wheels. Much of what I made turned out pretty good, some were failures. Usually if it doesn’t work as I envision I can spot the flaw and with a bit of adjustment, remedy what ever isn’t right to get it working to its full potential.

Angry is certainly right about longer masts needing to be stronger than shorter ones. But the pull on the planers isn’t as strong as you might think. Sometime back in the 1980s I made my first mast system. First I made one similar to Jkclark’s. Then I experienced what Thundercat mentioned, that being the tether line had a tendency to catch on reels and rods on turns, threatening to pull the rods overboard. Like Lickety said, the tethers also were dangerous to fishing hats and eye glasses.

I lengthened the Tee at the top and though that worked, I wasn’t satisfied so I went to Plan B. I made a couple of sockets out of steel pipe, fastened them to a bulkhead at the front of boat and slid a length of 3/4 galvanized steel conduit called “thinwall” into each socket. The sockets were angled so the conduits stick out to the side. I used one conduit for each side so I have twin masts at the bow in a Vee formation.

So, worrying, along AP’s thought lines, how long should the conduit be. (They come in 10 foot lengths.) So first trip out with the new system, I brought along a hacksaw. I’d try 10 feet, then depending on how that worked, I could saw it progressively shorter until I found the optimum length. Surprisingly, the ten footers worked great. How great?

Now that I’m a pro, I can afford just about any piece of gear I want. I also have to use what works and only use what works well. The current Brother Nature is the 3rd boat still using the same sockets I built 30 some years ago. My masts are still 10' lengths of thinwall.

The nice thing about thinwall is it’s built to be able to bend. Every ten trips or so, it assumes a gradual bend, but I just grab it and bend it back straight. It bends mostly near the bottom. Once I’ve bent it back a half dozen times, I reverse it so the top is bottom and vise-versa and it’s like new. Every three or four years I splurge and swap the old ones for new. Current price at Lowe’s is $3.74 per section. Big spender, eh!

As far as the snubber on the boards, I don’t know if they would really help anything or not. Anyone tried them with and without to see if they really do anything? Might be something that seemed like a good idea and it got passed around. I’ve never used them or been with anyone who does. Won’t hurt but it’s just one more thing and one more expense.

I mentioned earlier I just use chalk/masons line for tether. It has some stretch. Maybe if I were using dacron I’d feel different about the snubber, or bend the conduit more often. Can’t say.

Just saying if it works, that’s good, if it’s cheap, that’s even better. Attached is a photo of my mast sytem. It shows another benefit -- it's not in the way in the bow.