At 5'5" and 138 pounds - and 68 years old it's downright dangerous - for me - to attempt stepping the mast solo. The slack shrouds (in the danger zone - mast between 35 and 60° of vertical) allow for far too much lateral movement of the mast and can result in bending your hinge pin shank easily. I've come up with a twin-gin pole system and stepping process using the trailer's bow winch that works beautifully. It certainly adds to the set-up and break-down time but it is SAFE. If there's interest I can take some photos and videos of my process.
Was that Lou Ferrigno raising that mast? Then, I might believe the mast is easy for one person to raise. The mast on my 1968 FS is hard to raise with even two people. The main problem is it is really tough to keep the thing from swaying, until you get it up to the point where the shrouds tighten up. If you can keep it balanced you're ok. But, if you let the mast get off center by more than a millimeter you have to fight an incredible amount of leverage going pulling it to the side. The pin also comes out easily. You can make any video you want with some guy lifting it up with one finger even if you want. It's not true. Maybe they painted a foam mast silver and raised it up.
I had to buy a mast sleeve, because I tried to do this myself and bent the aluminum. I don't advise anyone to do this by themselves. Unless you want to bend your aluminum and buy a mast sleeve. Which leads me to think, why doesn't a FS mast just COME with a mast sleeve??!!!
At 5'5" and 138 pounds - and 68 years old it's downright dangerous - for me - to attempt stepping the mast solo. The slack shrouds (in the danger zone - mast between 35 and 60° of vertical) allow for far too much lateral movement of the mast and can result in bending your hinge pin shank easily. I've come up with a twin-gin pole system and stepping process using the trailer's bow winch that works beautifully. It certainly adds to the set-up and break-down time but it is SAFE. If there's interest I can take some photos and videos of my process.
Was that Lou Ferrigno raising that mast? Then, I might believe the mast is easy for one person to raise. The mast on my 1968 FS is hard to raise with even two people. The main problem is it is really tough to keep the thing from swaying, until you get it up to the point where the shrouds tighten up. If you can keep it balanced you're ok. But, if you let the mast get off center by more than a millimeter you have to fight an incredible amount of leverage going pulling it to the side. The pin also comes out easily. You can make any video you want with some guy lifting it up with one finger even if you want. It's not true. Maybe they painted a foam mast silver and raised it up.
I had to buy a mast sleeve, because I tried to do this myself and bent the aluminum. I don't advise anyone to do this by themselves. Unless you want to bend your aluminum and buy a mast sleeve. Which leads me to think, why doesn't a FS mast just COME with a mast sleeve??!!!