Nacra Racing suspends delivery of Nacra 17 with carbon mast

by ISAF on 3 Jan 2013 Nacra Racing has reported to the International Sailing Federation with the following communication:

Due to quality issues with the upper section of the carbon mast, decision has been taken to suspend delivery of the Nacra 17 with the carbon mast.

The Nacra 17 will be delivered with an alloy mast until further notice. This mast section is similar to that of the Nacra F16 and F18. All teams which have already taken delivery of the Nacra 17 will receive an alloy mast and fittings to retrofit their boat.

We expect that delivery of the carbon mast will resume as soon as we are 100% convinced about the solution. All alloy masts in the marketplace will be swapped back to carbon masts. Instructions will follow.

Above actions has been discussed and agreed with both ISAF and NACRA 17 class association

In the process of finding the limits sailing with the curved daggerboards equipped Nacra 17, various teams have been sailing in conditions above 25 knots of wind accompanied with big waves thus huge loads on the boat during sailing and capsizing.

Although expected and taken into account in the design and test phase we found that some teams discovered cracks in their mast above the hound below the top of the mast.

Nacra Sailing regrets these problems and is fully aware of this situation and is taking its full responsibility. We believe that any Nacra products should be strong enough, also in extreme rough conditions as we have proven in the last 35+years. We are working hard with our design and production teams to overcome these problems and apologise for any inconvenience caused.

If you have any questions You can contact your regular contact within the organisation of Nacra Sailing, your dealer, distributor or if direct purchased by MNA's through info(at)nacrasailing.com . We are more than happy to answer your questions but please bear with us as it can be busy as you can imagine.

As soon as we have more information we will report ourselves through the common channels such as Nacra Class Association website and Nacra Sailing website.