Sleeving broken aluminium mast

[madboutcats]

G'day I've picked up a Aluminium Taipan 5.7 mast thats broken about 3ft from the base and I want to repair it as a spare to keep at the club. I have mast section to sleeve it with and I have cut the twisted pieces of. My plan is to put a new section on the base then internal sleeve followed by an external sleeve to be welded.

My question is what length would be right for the internal sleeve?

What length for the external sleeve?

[darcy1945]

External sleeve about 50cm, internal 60cm. I wouldn't weld (welding will soften the mast), but rivet it and make sure you stagger the rivets so that they don't form a line around the mast. Use plenty of Duralac and monel rivets.

[NixonJr]

Rex Gibbs has done this to many stingray masts.

His contact details can be found on the stingray website

http://www.stingraycatamaran.com/

[Fluid_Drive]

The welding could be an option, but i don't know whether you could apply a heat treatment to the area to regain its full strength, like you can with steel.

[Loose Change]

Welding of masts is generally not an option as masts are made of 6061 T6 grade alloy which has a specialised heat treatment to harden it and you could not replicate this with just welding. Internal and external sleeving on the other hand is an excellent method of joining broken masts, as Darcy has said, be sure to stagger the rivets and don't come any closer to an edge than 3D.