[Editors Note: During the 2012 Frostbite race, a wind gust whipped Jeff McKamey's O’Day 272 around and ripped the chainplate for the port shroud right through the deck of the boat, dismasting the yacht.]
Hi all,
Sunday, Jeff was working on his repair project and I got a good look at the “Whys” his boat’s port chainplate broke loose.
(A previous owner of Mark’s O’Day 272 must have known something, as his chainplates have had very, very large reinforcements added.)
After Jeff’s experence on the 1st, thought it’d be a good idea to check My LOVE 2, specially since shes almost 40 years old.
I climbed on board her this afternoon (Inside thermometer read over 70*.) and checked my upper shroud’s chain plate’s attachments.
I didn’t like what I saw, so took some measurements and am planning to add much larger additional backing plates behind the bulkheads that the upper shrouds chainplates are attached.
I believe it’ll spread out the load and add lots more strength to the attachment locations.
When the winds up, I sometimes sail ML2 too hard to worry about chainplates coming loose !
CL 
