Dude, where’s my stump?

 I was planning to show you guys the photos of all the cool improvements I’ve made this year.  Ride-height adjustor, new gantry, stuff like that, but now I have a new moth chronicle to relate.  I went out sailing early this morning because the forecast was 10-15 diminishing by noon.  I rigged up the boat and it looked like it was starting to blow pretty good on the water.  I was ready to try and get some good numbers on the GPS.  I headed out and started sailing downwind.  The wind was a bit puffy and I instantly was sailing 15-18 kts with good control.  As I made it down the lake farther the wind started to pick up more.  I sailed down the lake for about a mile and then came back up to meet some family members who where sailing my way on keelboat.   I pasted them going upwind and then bore away again in a big puff.  This one was really strong.  The GPS log put me at 20+ knots for over 60 seconds with a max speed of 23 kts, my new personal best.  The boat handled fairly good but I decided to work my way back upwind in the big breeze.  Upwind was pretty hard, by now it was blowing 25-30 steady and I was having a hard time getting the boat going into the stiff breeze.  I sailed back to the marina and took a break hoping the wind would settle a bit.  About an hour later I headed back out.  The breeze was down a bit, but pretty steady around 20 with some good waves.  I was sailing downwind at about 18 kts and stuffed the bow into a wave, it didn’t seem like a bad impact but the terrible crunching sound told a different story.   The boat flipped over and I instantly knew something was very wrong.  I righted the boat but the rig was clearly down.  Looking forward the reason became instantly clear.  The mast stump was completely gone, just a jagged hole remained in the top of the boat.  The rack struts just hung in space.  I wasn’t too far from shore and the wind was blowing me that way so I wasn’t too worried about being stuck in the lake.  I swam the boat toward shore and watched helplessly as the mast which was now bouncing in the waves on the unsupported racks breaking the joints.  It took some effort to keep the gaping hole on the top of the boat from taking on water and filling the forward tank.  Finely I got to shore and started taking the boat apart.  Shortly after my family came along looking for me and we stacked all the broken parts on the deck and started back to the marina.

After taking everything apart and looking at the broken bits I’m happy to say that Mothball 1 will sail again, but not this season.  The racks should be easy to fix and there wasn’t much other damage.  Thankfully I didn’t lose anything.  The remains of the mast stump were held to the boat by a small guide and the tiny line for the ride-height adjustor.  The stump had failed by compressing forward into the deck.  I should be able rebuild it and reinforce the area to take the massive loads that I’m starting to put on the boat.   All in all it was a good day.  I’m just glad I didn’t get hurt or sink, but mothing season 2012 is now over :(