Olson 34- main sheet pad eye on boom broke

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PNW Jeff

Member I
Yesterday while racing we jibed without sheeting in the main first- mistake. Gusts were in the low 20s and the pad eye riveted inside the boom to hold the main sheet block broke. I used a couple sail ties and made a bridle on the boom so we could keep sailing.

I’m thinking of a dyneema boom strop to hold the block and spread the load.

Is anybody using something different than the original pad eye they can recommend?
 
Christian Williams

Christian Williams

E381 - Los Angeles
Senior Moderator
Blogs Author
Just an opinion, but if the rivets were old and corroded (aluminum perhaps?), which since they failed apparently were compromised, I'd probably just put the fitting back on with stainless rivets. The connection was the original boom design, I take it.

Some booms use bales, which are easy to install and do accommodate side forces better, especially if the O34 has a single-point mainsheet attachment.
 
P

PNW Jeff

Member I
Christian Williams said:
Just an opinion, but if the rivets were old and corroded (aluminum perhaps?), which since they failed apparently were compromised, I'd probably just put the fitting back on with stainless rivets. The connection was the original boom design, I take it.

Some booms use bales, which are easy to install and do accommodate side forces better, especially if the O34 has a single-point mainsheet attachment.
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The rivets are still there. The bail tore off the stainless plate. No corrosion marks. Just failed in tension due to the shock load. Same thing happened to another olson34 two weeks ago at our club. We have 4 at Portland Yacht Club.

The plate is inside the boom- the rivets only hold it from sliding fore and aft.

I think im replacing the padeye then I’ll put two dyneema webbing straps on the boom and use the pad eye only to stop it moving fore and aft.
 
Loren Beach

Loren Beach

O34 - Portland, OR
Senior Moderator
Blogs Author
I had something happen similar to ours, about two years into my ownership. There is T shape ss weldment. It was a Kenyon idea AFAIK.
In our case, the inside plate had broken on one end of the eye plate which was welded to it.
I took the boom home and took it apart. What with the multi-part purchase for the outhaul and transiting two reef lines and the rope tail for the outhaul, it's kind of crowded in there.
Anyhow, with the broken part out, I took to a local small fab. shop. The guy listened to how the rod put up-force on the fitting, and then welded a reinforcing 'fin' along the top after welding the main firing back together.

Back to the mainsheet question. Our upper blocks (Harken triple) was shackled to an eye strap on the boom. Nowadays I have a line there, connecting to the lower triple about 3 feet lower.

Jeff, does your mainsheet eye extend down thru a slot in the bottom of the boom? Did the boom metal tear? A photo would help some of us trying to form a mental image. :confused:
 
P

PNW Jeff

Member I
Loren Beach said:
I had something happen similar to ours, about two years into my ownership. There is T shape ss weldment. It was a Kenyon idea AFAIK.
In our case, the inside plate had broken on one end of the eye plate which was welded to it.
I took the boom home and took it apart. What with the multi-part purchase for the outhaul and transiting two reef lines and the rope tail for the outhaul, it's kind of crowded in there.
Anyhow, with the broken part out, I took to a local small fab. shop. The guy listened to how the rod put up-force on the fitting, and then welded a reinforcing 'fin' along the top after welding the main firing back together.

Back to the mainsheet question. Our upper blocks (Harken triple) was shackled to an eye strap on the boom. Nowadays I have a line there, connecting to the lower triple about 3 feet lower.

Jeff, does your mainsheet eye extend down thru a slot in the bottom of the boom? Did the boom metal tear? A photo would help some of us trying to form a mental image. :confused:
Click to expand...
The boom is fine. The eye of the weldment came through the slot in the boom. This is the photo I have of the post break fitting before I drilled it out and a photo of the pad eye plate after removal.
 

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P

PNW Jeff

Member I
Photo showing where the pad eye came through the boom. Ignore the calipers. I wanted to capture the rivet dimension before I drilled it.
 

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Loren Beach

Loren Beach

O34 - Portland, OR
Senior Moderator
Blogs Author
Looks like the welded eye was pulled off the base plate (?) If so, and that's a guess, buy a new one and install it...
 
ConchyDug

ConchyDug

Member III
Dyneema strops seem like an improvement could just use a padeye for positioning/holding the strop where you want it on the boom. I did a Google search a few weeks ago looking at mainsheet arrangements that we wanna try to on a Henderson 30 and came across several Olson mainsheet set ups that are pretty sweet. Here is the link. https://www.olson30.org/boat-setup/traveler-mainsheet/ Something like the 8:1 or 16:1 is what we recreated.
 
Loren Beach

Loren Beach

O34 - Portland, OR
Senior Moderator
Blogs Author
Just visited our boat and brought back a picture of our sheet attachment point on the boom. This may help clarify things a bit.Main Attachment.JPG
 
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