I drove to look at one of these boats yesterday. Everything looked very good IMO...until just before I was ready to leave I looked up to the top of the mast to check out the wind guage and was surprised at how much bend was in the mast.
I know the Hunters have some pre-bend built into the mast, but my understanding is that is done over the length of the mast, a lot of this bend appears to be above the top set of spreaders.
Just a wild guess...(I didn't think of measuring it with the halyard until I was part way home) but I think it was at least 6-7 inches. It was certainly looked bent more at least the thickness of the mast. I read that the standard is 1% pre-bend over the length of the mast...which should calculate out to something like 4" of bend.
Here's a couple of pictures, but it's not all that easy to determine how much deflection there is from them.
This boat has been raced weekly and does have a backstay adjuster added to it (non-stock.) I'm a little worried that might have been cranked down too tight on a regular basis and distorted the mast.
What do you think?