The Carbon Longeron: How a Recycled America’s Cup Mast Changed Everything

The longeron is the big black pole that runs down the middle of the trampoline. It’s probably the single most transformative thing we’ve done to Paikea, and we somehow managed to not really talk about it properly until now.

Before it went in, there was a wide fibreglass walkway running down the centre of the boat with a storage box you had to step over. It was functional — you could walk to the anchor, it stopped the front beam pressing backwards, and it gave Paikea somewhere to fly a jib and a symmetrical spinnaker from each bow. But as a sailing platform it was a compromise, and as a structure it was doing its job in the least elegant way possible.

The longeron is a section of America’s Cup mast — from the same batch that became the front beams. Our friend Ewen was about to turn them into fence posts. We convinced him we could find a better use for carbon that had been through an America’s Cup campaign, and he very generously let us have them. The top of the mast, with all its halyard exits and hardware still attached, became the bow pole.

What it gave us was substantial. A centreline launch point for the code zero, A3, and masthead spinnakers — sails that were impossible to fly properly before. An inner forestay for the storm jib, which is a real safety upgrade in heavy weather. And because the longeron is stiff enough to be completely self-supporting, there are no whisker stays or water stays — no holes in the hulls, no lines to catch on anchor bridles, no drag, nothing to snag. The front end is clean.

The trampoline got bigger too. A slender carbon pole where the wide walkway was means more usable deck area, less weight, and a cleaner look.

The rigging setup for the inner forestay runs the halyard inside the mast, out through a slot at the base, and parks on a dedicated cleat when not in use to keep things tidy. Luff tension goes in at the tack end with a two-to-one purchase, soon to be three-to-one. The tack lines for the code zero and spinnakers run back to the winch on the mast via friction rings — the same system that means nobody has to crawl out to the end of the pole to clip a kite on, which is a manoeuvre we did once between the Canaries and the Azores with good crew on board, and which we don’t recommend and won’t be repeating.

In This Series

This post is part of the Front End Build Series. Load paths, vacuum bagging, forestay fittings, seagull striker, martingale, trampoline installation and sea trials are all documented in the series Paikea’s Carbon Front End Rebuild.

The entire playlist is featured below:

Additional behind the scenes photos of the build showing more detail in the members’ technical library Join here.