I wrote this quick blog today to answer the question I received from two people in the last few days. The question is WHAT IS THIS? (as seen in one of our recent videos on Patrick’s Youtube Channel.
What’s your guess? Does your sailboat have one of these? Here is a hint…What do you know about Sailboat lightning protection?
We have never had a problem in storms at the marina, in an anchorage or at sea, knock on wood maybe because we have always had this on the mast. It’s not broken, so we haven’t tried to fix it or improve upon it. 43 years and all is well!
Answer:
It’s a Forespar Lightning Master Static dissipater. It has been on our boat since I bought it in 2001. It is supposed to reduce the exposure to a direct lightning strike by controlling the conditions which trigger direct strikes. This is what West Marine says about it. “It reduces the build-up of static ground charge and retards the formation of the ion streamer which complete the path for a lightning strike. By employing the point-discharge principle, the Lightning Master continually leaks off the lightning-causing ground potential in low amperage over a long period of time instead of the short duration, high amperage discharge occurring with a lightning strike. More detail by clicking on the image above…
Does it work. Knock on wood, but we haven’t been struck yet…but it’s all voo doo to me really! I’m not sure anyone knows the absolute on any of this! But in all the times we have had lightning all around us, and other boats have been struck in the same marina or anchorage we have been in, and nothing has ever been damaged by lightning, I am NOT going to take it off and tempt fate!
Here are the two videos where you may get a glimpse of the lightning dissipater on Brick House:
I didnt know what it was either. I thought it was a devise to keep birds off the mast. We bought our Hatteras with it mounted on the radar arch. In 6 years time, 2 boats on either side of me were hit with lightning. I have never been touched. I actually think it works. Well, at least for me. Now that we have a sailboat I was thinking of installing one too. If it can dissipate some static maybe it will help.
I agree with you. We are always lucky with lightning, but it could be something else entirely to be honest, that gives us that luck 🙂 Thanks your commenting. Usually if one or two people ask…you know dozens more are wondering, hence the quick post 🙂