Neil Pryde X9 mast stuck – a experienced peculiarity.

From time to time we’ve probably all tried not being able to separate a mast after a windsurfing session. Normally a couple of booms fixed on either of the two mast halves, a couple of twists and some pulling will do the job.

Lately, at my place we’ve had a couple of incidents with stuck (newer) Neil Pryde X9 masts, where this trick didn’t work – in fact the trick worsened the problem. We’re not talking about the very ill-fated first generations of X9 masts, but about masts from the newer generation with much thicker walls and perceptible higher weight.

The victims of the X9-sticking incidents are (locally) well known as high level riders that really take care of their gear, and both swear that the masts were never close to even tiniest grain of sand. Both identically explain the general assembling and separation feeling of these particular masts as “a pretty tight, good quality feeling with no slack(?)”, but perhaps with a touch of “unevenness” when pushing the top section on the ferule.

As the X9 mast sticking incidents were pretty much alike, from pure laziness they’ll be described as one incident here:

After a longer session on the water the mast became absolutely impossible to separate. No mater how many booms that were fixed on either section on the mast, no mater how much twisting effort (the mast could be twisted with a lot of resistance), and no matter how much manpower used – the result were the same: The top section could (with BIG effort) be moved approx. 5 centimetres down the ferule – and that was it! Continuously twisting and pulling only produced a lot of (induced) heat between the top section and the ferule, and the twisting and pulling effort gradually became harder until it came to a halt.

In an (logic) attempt to lubricate and to cool down the sticking area the mast plug was removed, a hose pipe was mounted at the tip of the mast, and a mast base (tightened with some tape, cloths etc.) was mounted at the bottom of the mast – and water under some pressure was pumped into the mast.

The cooling down and the lubrication soon allowed a little twisting again – but as there was no or very little water coming out in the ferule area the intended cooling/lubrication was not a complete success. And consequently the mast sections in fact didn’t come farther apart – not much at least.

To make a looong story short it turned out that the key to getting the mast halves unstuck was to continue pumping water into the mast - but the way to allow the water to penetrate the almost watertight area between the ferule and the top section was certainly NOT to twist the mast halves. The only way to allow the water to come out was to create small passages between ferule and top section by moving the mast up and down (no twisting!) while the mast was placed on a couple of jacks. But it was not sufficient with a little water coming out – it was first when the water came out with a pace so that a lot of black “debris” was pouring out too that something really happened. Now it was suddenly a piece of cake to twist the mast a little and separate it.

What happened? Well, inspecting the mast after the separation revealed a pretty pronounced groove in the ferule (around three quarter down the ferule), and all the black “debris” coming out of the mast during the last successful separation process seemingly came from this groove.

The theory could be: The light “hump” both mast owners did feel when gathering and separating the masts of course indicates a very tight fitting point between ferule and top section, and with the sections working a little during sailing a little material is “sanded” of off the softer part (the ferule, see later). This sanded off debris now forms a kind of o-ring between the ferule and the top section – an o-ring that doesn’t allow the sections to be separated – and the more you twist the sections, the more debris you create, and the deeper the groove. In a very short time the picture is a watertight o-ring placed in a groove in the ferule – an o-ring that gets tighter and tighter the more effort you place in twisting and pulling the mast. In this context it’s no surprise that the only way to break the “evil ring” is to flex the mast (with NO twisting) up and down while water under pressure is pumped into the mast – with the hopeful result that eventually the water starts coming out from between the ferule and top section with a power that brings with it ALL the “gluing” debris.

So – why have we (so far) only seen this phenomenon with (newer) Neil Pryde X9 masts? Hard to tell – but a closer inspection of the ferules of the masts indicated, that the original very tight and quality feel when gathering and separating the mast halves was obtained by putting on some (epoxy) filler material on the ferule (indicated by no weave structure to be seen). The result is that the harder material (the carbon/glass weave) of the top section always “defeats” the softer filler coating of the ferule when the it’s allowed to rub a little against each other. And therefore the creation of the locking debris …

Anyway, at least that’s one theory. And if your newer Neil Pryde X9 mast become impossible to separate the normal way, why not try this solution to unlock it?