Its been a busy month. John and David have worked on getting the deck beams and associated stuff in place for laying the new deck. Here’s a picture of David using a sledge hammer to get the 5/8″ bronze rod down through the rather tight 5/8″ hole through the mast partners and into the compression post below. It appears that John has drawn the short-straw since he’s the fellow stuck holding onto the bronze as David pounds on it. Everyone calls it a “compression” post but really it seems to be a “tension” post from its function. This post is a wood post with bronze rod inside it installed about 6″ forward of the main mast that the deck pulls up on (post in tension) while sailing. If the deck is pulling up putting the post in tension, the 5/8″ rod then helps hold the deck “down” because the rod is bolted thru the deck on one end and thru the mast step (down in the bilge) on the other end. There are two of these posts–one right in front of the main mast and one right behind the foremast. The tension comes from the fact that the sailing loads on the chainplates place a load inward literally squeezing the hull. The cambered deck beams will arc further up allowing more hull movement without this post in place. Why it is called a compression post is beyond me unless the folks calling it that are thinking about the poor boat getting squeezed! But, it is the tension in this post that comes to the rescue preventing the squeeze/compression!