I was rebedding a pulpit the other day and the pins in the lifelines were put in the opposite of the above picture. I explained to the owner that I like to put them in as above as if the ring ding for some reason backs out and the boat is heeled the pin will either fall into the boat and you have a possibility of saving it from going overboard or it stays in place due to gravity. I really prefer lashing them on with spectra with the line going around the 1″ round. You are therefore not relying on the spot welds on the loops, there are no pins to go missing and if you have a man overboard you can knife the top lifeline to make it easier to get the MOB back onboard.

 I also had another pulpit that sheared so I to relead the bow light electrical as it was damaged and I couldn’t fish the end back out. I used fishing line and a pencil sinker pushing this into the hole in the pulpit and then jiggling it back and forth to get it around the twists and turns. Sounds easy but time consuming and frustrating.

I have been building a new boom for my brother’s moore 24 and also finishing off the mast which we bought from Buzz Ballenger. One of the important things to think about when making the holes in the mast for fittings is to make sure you use a file to round of the corners of any rectangular cuts made for sheaves. This is important whether it is a carbon mast or an aluminum mast. Last year we had the unfortunate situation of falling victim to a hole that was cut in the mast, the corners were not rounded off and the hole was oversized (at the time we were winning our class) we ended up retiring from the regatta due to the subsequent mast failure (see picture). N.B. The hole was not cut by the mast manufacturer but by someone after the rig had been delivered.

I use cardboard to create a template for the fitting that I am installing on the mast. I then trace the template onto the rig at the correct point, drill a large hole and then use a jigsaw to cut the section out. Next I take a file and make the hole the correct size for the fitting taking off a little at a time. Lastly I take a rat tail file and round of the corners. I take some electrical tape and use it as an insulator between the stainless and the aluminum by taping the plate and then using a razor to remove the excess tape. I use tefgel on the screws or rivets that hold the fitting in place to stop the electrolysis between the two different metals.

After spending way too much time untangling messenger line I decided what was needed was a cassette that would house the line and allow me to go up the mast and drop a tag line down inside the rig easily. The result was a search for industrial chalk lines that took me to Amazon.com where I buy Keson G150 Giant Chalk boxes. The cassettes will hold up to 150 feet of tagline. What I do is remove the chalk line and replace it with dacron tagline from Svends. I then go to the local bike shop and get some used bike chain. I cut sections about 8 inches long and I can tie this to the tagline. To stop the bike chain from wrapping around spreader bars in the rig take some electrical shrink wrap and shrink wrap the bike chain. The result is a long thin weight that will allow you to swiftly drop a new tagline into the rig from the masthead. The chain is flexible enough to bend into the rig over the halyard sheaves. When you want to coil it up you just open up the handle and with 3 to 1 ratio it is cleanly housed in the box with no tangles.

I have four different types of peeling strops for different reasons/boats – some are for asym some for sym boats or both.

1) Double tack line – if it is not class legal we install the extra clutch for offshores and take off for inshores. Just make sure if your deck is balsa core that you have put epoxy plugs in so that when you remove and fill with a screw and silicone for inshore racing you don’t get a mushy core due to water infiltration. Two single blocks for sure. Great for retractable pole boats and large sprit boats that have halyard locks. On large sprit boats you rig a martin breaker and are well clear when the tack is remotely spiked for you.

2) A long strop off the jib tack ring with tylaska on each end – also discussed above. Good for retractable sprit boats as that way you hoist on the strop then put the tack line on the new sail when the old one has been spiked away. Really only use this technique if you aren’t set up to do the other methods or you rarely do peels and don’t want the expense of a different system.

3) A peeling ring – Two captive tylaska go in the top segments for tack of spinnaker. Then you attach your guys and tack line to the bottom segment. You can either splice the tack line to this ring direct or you can tylaska (advantage of tylaska is you can remove when the wind is light and you don’t want all the hardware dragging the sail down) splice = cheaper. Also tylaska if you have a mixed asym, sym inventory. Pole doesn’t get moved at all during the peel you just clip the new tack on the other tylaska and spike away the old (kind of like what you do with the tack on a jib peel!). Also how many times as a bowman have you been up there trying to fit the guys and tackline on the tack ring of the sail as it has been set up incorrectly. Harder to use the martin breaker set up on this system so it is better to do on smaller boats (i.e. up to 70 foot) as the recoil on the larger boats means you don’t want your head in the way.

4) My old favourite that is great for short handed sailing and works really well on sym peels. A strop with a tylaska on one end and a clip on the other it is about 12 inches long. You go out on the end of the pole (if fully crewed) or drop the pole forward (if single/doublehanded) and clip drectly onto the guy on the aft side of the pole. You take the strop under the pole and connect to the clew ring on the old sail. You spike the clew of the old sail and it is now on the strop. You attach the clew of the new spinnaker to the guy and hoist the kite. When you are ready to get rid of the old sail you spike the strop and then drop the kite. The strop will run down the guy to the guy block so when you have finished the drop etc. you just pick up your strop from the weather side of the boat.