Views From Aloft
This was a spar finish and rigging package that we put together back in the summer of 2014. Originally this mast was an Annapolis Spars design (our previous employer). I love the way these masts were built.
This is exactly how the top of a Pro Furl furler “Wrapstop” system should look when the sail is hoisted.
The boat, a Baba 40, has done some fairly good cruising since we last saw it. The customer wanted us to make sure that it all looked ‘up to snuff’ and the mast tune was in good shape. We are pleased to announce that everything looks like the day we finished it!
There was also some talk about adding back a new mast mounted radar for which we left the old wiring hole and made sure there was a second (short) conduit in place for future additions. Nice!
Dyneema is the new vinyl coated wire. Support your boom with rope fiber instead of metal wire and your sail will love you for it!
Hayn Marine swage fittings still looking sharp after two years plus.
Thanks for taking a look at the view and please ask us any questions below…
~T.R.C.
Hello!
Thanks for the interesting stuff that you publish.
Pictures above show the upper cap of the foil placed an inch or two below the forestay’s top terminal. I was told, that such setup may lead to failure of the forestay wire where it emerges from the foil. Failure can be caused by repetitive (although very slight) bending of the forestay with each tack. In order to prevent this, the foil must be long enough to place the top cap on the swaged part of top terminal.
What do you think? Does it really matter where a foil ends? If it does, how about Sta-Lok and similar terminals which will not fit in to any end cap?
Hi Denis,
You are absolutely right! The wire is protruding a bit more on this one than I’d like to see. We serviced this furler and just replaced the stay inside of it. If we had built the furler originally I would have liked to see the foil closer to the swage (by about half of the distance). The point of wire damage at the top of a furler is a concern, but is likely not caused by too much wire sticking out. As long as the wire is adequately tensioned, the halyard cannot warp around the stay, and system is spinning freely, all things should be fine. You can see on this one that after 2-3 years of regular use it is still in good shape.
Although there are some, most top cap and upper bearing designs do not allow for even a swage fitting (much less a mechanical fitting as you mentioned) to fit down into the foil. Some units that I can think of that did this were the older Harken furlers. The real goal here is to maximize the foil length but still allow for stay length adjustment (via the turnbuckle at the bottom) without binding the the extrusions/ furler system.
I hope that helps to explain. Thank you for taking the time to comment.
~T.R.C.