I'm building a Skerry and just glued the two halves of the mast together.
I bought a new router, to round the edges. It did not go well. Things started out okay. Then I stopped the router, rearranged some clamps, and started again, and realized that the bit had slipped, and was cutting much deeper than I intended. I reset the bit, tightened the nut, same result.
This is a new Bosch router. It is slightly different from the one I've used before, and I see how I screwed up.
Is this mast still usable? Can I just sand it smooth and move on, or will the mast be too weak?
I know the photos are missing, having some trouble linking them...
I'm not sure why image posting isn't working, but here are links to the images of my butchered mast.
http://geophile.com/boat/clc/IMG_2614.jpg
http://geophile.com/boat/clc/IMG_2615.jpg
Your pictures posted just fine.
1. Pack it with woodflour/epoxy putty, sand it to the correct shape and wrap it with fiberglass for at least 2" above and below the damaged area; or
2. Same, but wrap it with unidirectional carbon fiber and then glass; or
3. Cut out the damaged parts and glue in pieces of wood to fill the empty spots, then wrap as either 1 or 2 above.
It's just a Skerry, you don't need to worry about it standing up to the wind going around the Horn.
Finally, you can also go to your favorite DIY store and overpay for clear pine, glue enough pieces together (with Titebond III if you've run out of epoxy) to get the thickness you need and shape that. Again, it's just a Skerry and doesn't have to stand up to that much stress. If you're feeling nervous, glass it. I've used Home Depot Select Pine to make a mast for my sailing dinghy and it's lasted over a decade.
Laszlo
I don't know routers well. I rounded my mast with a plane and sandpaper. As a result I took only minimal material off. That said that's a pretty deep cut and despite what Laszlo said I have seen some significant mast flex with my lug rig in gusty weather even with a reef. I sort of would prefer scabbing in some wood with epoxy and filler then finish rounding and smoothing. After that I'd consider reinforcing with glass before finishing with varnish. I'd make a point of laying the glass on the bias along the length of the mast.
I have applied epoxy/wood filler, and will finish sanding and routing that today.
Can you tell me more about "laying the glass on the bias along the length of the mast"? I'm not quite sure what that means.
Laying the glass on the bias means that the threads are not aligned with the length and width of the mast. Instead, they are at 45 degrees to those directions. That is a good thing to do for loads that occur in multiple directions.
However, keep in mind that the major load on a mast is lengthwise. Compared to the sail bending the mast in the leeward direction, the twists and other loads are reasonably indignificant.
Bias-cut glass will sit better and distribute the load over the pieced together mast better, but to resist the wind loads long continuous threads running the length of the mast are a better solution. In this case, it'd be smart to do both - one layer of glass applied on the bias and a second layer with threads oriented lengthwise. (For woven instead of uni, the threads that wrap around the mast won't do much but they won't hurt, either).
Laszlo