Turning a Ty mast into a flag pole

[Les Bloom]

I have the remaining upper 21ft.+ of my original typhoon
mast that was knocked down in a storm two years ago
(Insurance company paid for a new replacement and then some,
I did the work myself, with some help from Greg Ross long distance
via e-mail).

Anyway I have been toying with the idea of making a flag pole out
of the mast for my back yard. Any one had any experience doing this, ideas comments,or plans. Any how to's, what to do or not to do.

[Gary M]

Hey Les,

I think it's a wonderful idea.

If possible try to find a piece of pip or something to use as a sleeve. You can set this sleeve in concrete and just slide the mast into it. This will make it easy to "step" the mast for any maintenance.

If you can't find a sleeve it might be possible to just dig the hole, insert the mast and fill with concrete, but pull the mast out before it sets making the concreat the sleeve.

I would leave the spreaders on and let it look like a mast.

It would also be great to have a light or two at the top to light the flag so you could display your flag 24 hours.

I did this with my flag pole using low voltage landscape lighting. It works great. You have to deal with what is available, but I mounted a single gange water proof electrical box at the top of my flag pole. From each end of the box I mounted 45 degree pipe fittings that just happened to hold a low voltage bulb perfectly.

I ran wires up the pole and hooked it to my existing Malibu light transformer which is on a timer.

So at sunset the light comes on, lighting the flag, and at sunrise it goes off.

You'll be looking seriously good making the same flag pole out of a Ty mast.

Also consider halyards to the spreaders if you want to add more flags or pennants. It will be awsome.

You could make a pennent that greets guest or who knows what.

Let me know what you finally do, but do it.

Gary

[mike feeney]

I made a flagpole from a Star mast which had a small stress fissure. It is tall (35') and thin. I put it in concrete and it has withstood summer and winter NH gales. All hardware was stripped off and then I riveted on a cleat at the appropriate height.
It has an internal halliard which eliminates a lot of noise. The original wire to line was replaced with 1/4' nylon. I made (from rubber tubing) sleeves to fit over the snaps which helps keep a quiet "anchorage" when the wind is howling.
The biggest problem is that a standard 3'x5' flag looks a bit small even though my flag etiquette research indicates that 3x5 is in proportion to the mast height.
Since we are in a rural setting I would not light the flag, preferring to eliminate the light pollution although in some settings that might be attractive.
Spreaders are a nice touch if you have pennants to fly. Anything large will foul itself.
Do it. You will enjoy the 4th of July more.

[Chris Reinke]

Les - I made a flagpole out of an old wooden cat boat mast a few years ago. I wanted to avoid the problems of raising and dropping vertically into cement so I used two 4x4 posts on either side. Basically, I footed two 4x4 pressure treated posts into cement spaced slightly wider then the mast width. I then drilled a hole through the posts about 8" above the ground. I drilled a similar hole through the mast about 6" above the base. I then layed the mast between the posts and used a large bolt to secure then together. This provided a footing for the base of the mast and I used a come-a-long off a nearby tree to hoist the mast vertical (with a line to keep from going over). It is a very heavy wooden mast, but a smaller typhoon mast could be raised by hand. I then drilled 2 more holes through the posts/mast and secured with bolts. I used a few extra washers strategically placed between the posts and mast to ensure it was vertical.

This configuration makes lowering the mast possible should the halyard fail and need replacement, or to re-varnish.

[rtbates]

I did pretty much what Chris did. In my case I was using a mast from an e-scow. I made the pivot about 4 feet off the ground and up the mast. I then made a counter weight out of concrete set in a bucket along with the mast. The counter weight allows me to raise and lower the mast/flagpole with very little effort. A pin through the entire assembly at ground level keeps it upright till needed to be dropped.