Rigging Review

Here's a couple of the rigging details from 88


The main and jib halyards are switched inside the mast, so the main halyard is on the port side. This made sense to me since the main is less frequently adjusted (except when ours falls down) it can be on the lower winch, which is usually blocked by the spinnaker bag.

The reason ours was falling down is because I tried using a Spinlock SUA minijammer (top right in photo) for the lock off. It's a nice little design, but doesn't hold our main halyard. Not sure if it's the loads, or the fact that it gets bumped open too easy. No matter what the reason, it's been pitched in favor of an old fashioned aluminum horn cleat


Here you can see our entire kingpost. The funny looking arrangement on the stbd side is for our jib halyard. Mounting a clutch there, while unconventional, means that it can be released and even tensioned ( on stbd tack) from above deck. It works awesome.


Instead of using pins to hold our shroud turnbuckles in place, I loop velcro through both turnbuckle bodies. The velcro is stiched on one end, so it can't come loose. This makes adjusting a snap. It takes about 30 seconds to adjust both turnbuckles while sailing. This detail was especially helpful on our first race, as we only had about 45 minutes to break in and stretch out the shrouds, as they stretched about 1/4" when new. In the photo you can also see our twing system. That's just a sailmakers eye, spliced into some Robline racing sheet 4mm. Theres nothing lighter, but you have to get the sheets led right! It runs through a bushing in the deck, then aft to a turning block, then to the control boxes under deck. You can also see the sideways jib tracks. I'm so glad I kept the cars on these, as our second race turned into a reach, and we plugged a snatch block into the cars for the jib sheet, which gave us some really great legs on the people who didn't have a way to do this.



Whole bunch of stuff if this photo. The mast partner box is my design, made of G10 and epoxied/faired into the deck. The nice fitted shim are made by Bam to our spec (he's making one more to replace the temporary shims in this photo)

The shields shaped backing plates are Bams idea. I had a big uneven hole in the mast from where the vang bail had worked itself on the spar. We could have just used a round or square piece, but why do that when you can make something cool and 10x more complicated? They're bedded in with mylar film and riveted with duralac for corrosion.

The red lines there are our cunningham, nothing special except for the soft shackle holding it to the bail.

I'm especially proud of the vang on this boat. The cascade line splits into two ends, which are spliced to either side of the bottom fiddle block. This elimates the need for a SS triangle plate, and does the same job.

On to the bow. You can't really see it in this photo, but we've got a standard open body turnbuckle up there, but it's a prototype calibrated job from Hayn, which makes changing headstay tension between races a snap. It's held in place with some of Bam's velcro wrap pins. The tack fitting is a basic little snap shackle. The bungee (white line in photo) is there to keep the front of the pole from falling in the water. We had a moment this weekend where we were all wondering what the humming noise was. It was our pole travelling at 4kts through the water!


Round the back you see our traveler and back deck. The traveler is sweet! All of our gear is Harken wherever possible, and this thing works great. Its got a forward bend (matching the radius between our mast and the mainsheet bail) and is mounted on delrin risers (hollow delrin tube with the screws inside) to level the track, and actually raise the ends up a tiny bit. This means that when you blow the traveler line, the mainsheet doesn't get tighter, as it would with a straight track. The little bit of rise actually cracks it off just a touch. Its tough to tell, but the nonskid pattern is shaped around the traveler. All the purchase is below deck, and the white line is 1/8" Endura 12. The purchase is currently 6:1, although on light days I think I'll untie and move the purchase to 4:1. You can see our mainsheet, which is 9mm Robline racing sheet. Way in back there you can see our spinnaker turning blocks, which are 57mm Harken Ti Lite blocks. Nothing better.
Here's our control boxes. There are 40mm ratchets for the blocks, with Harken 150 cleats with the Extreme (2damax yo!) fairleads. Works really well. makes me wish I was trimming main! The litle cleat on the front is for the twings. Not sure if it's going to stay there or not. The vertical piece of teak is to stiffen up our deck, which is a bit soft. It was deflecting about 3" when everyone got on the rail. Now is solid as a rock. Instead of a spinnaker sheet winch, we have 57mm ratchets mounted on custom HDPE plates.



I just plain like this shot! I finally put our little eyestraps on the deck for the cover. It's green to match the old paint, but it actually doesn't look too bad. Im thinking the new cover (whenever that happens) will be dk red or blue. Thoughts?

Hours:
Kristian: a billion? Actually I figured it out last week, and we're into the 450 hour range.