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Main halyard jammed in the sheaves

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dmpilc
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
4593 Posts

Initially Posted - 04/09/2008 : 12:30:24

Well, yesterday I experienced our first ever halyard jam up at the masthead. Of course, the main was almost up to the spreaders when this happened, at our Club's first Learners at the Helm session for the season. I suspect that the halyard was not kept tensioned, allowing it to come off of the sheave and jam between the sheave and the divider plate. I decided that I would need to go up in the bosun's chair to try and free it if we were to get in any sailing, so up I went. Lost my left shoe going up the mast (later recovered the shoe from the water)but couldn't get the halyard unjammed. Totally forgot to take any tools up with me or a messenger line for the main halyard so we could at least get the sail down. Back to the slip we went to take the mast down.

Removed the boom from the mast track and let it dangle freely. Got the mast down using the whisker pole as a gin pole, and using 4 people plus myself. After some tugging and prying with a screwdriver, I was able to free it. We cleared the main off the mast, got it all organized, and up went the mast again. Ran out of daylight, so next trip to the lake, I've got to re-tune the rig.
We didn't get in any sailing to speak of, but everybody learned a lot about jammed halyards and dropping and raising the mast, something that has never been covered in detail at any prior Learners' sessions to my knowledge.

Hopefully, the halyard will be okay for the summer, and I can take it down again and swap out the sheaves and wire/rope halyards for all-rope ones. Whew, what an exhausting evening!

DavidP
1975 C-22 SK #5459 "Shadowfax" Fleet 52
PO of 1984 C-25 SK/TR #4142 "Recess"
Percy Priest Yacht Club, Hamilton Creek Marina, Nashville, TN

Edited by - dmpilc on 04/09/2008 14:06:51

dlucier
Master Marine Consultant

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Virgin Islands (United Kingdom)
7583 Posts

Response Posted - 04/09/2008 : 14:55:59

David,

First, sorry to hear of the mishap, but as Captain Ron says, "If anything's gonna happen, it's gonna happen out there."

Did you check for excessive play/space in the masthead sheaves when you had the mast down?

Edited by - on

Renzo
Admiral

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USA
621 Posts

Response Posted - 04/10/2008 : 08:51:58

I agree with Don about checking for excessive play or misalignment at the masthead sheaves. Also is your haylard the right diameter for the sheaves? Or are the sheaves showing excessive wear. I'm not the old man of the sea but this seems like a very rare occurance to me. I've never heard of it happening before; but if it happened to you once it is possible it will happen again and at the worst possible time.

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Dave Bristle
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Djibouti
10005 Posts

Response Posted - 04/10/2008 : 09:38:22

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Renzo
 ...but if it happened to you once it is possible it will happen again and at the worst possible time.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">Yup, and the quickest, most reliable fix is new sheaves for nice new 5/16" all rope halyards.

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stampeder
Master Marine Consultant

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1608 Posts

Response Posted - 04/10/2008 : 10:37:00

I had a jammed wire halyard a couple seasons ago. Lowered the mast, plucked the wire free with a good hand tug and learned a lesson.
The lesson: keep tension on the halyards.
It has not been an issue since.

Edited by - on

Renzo
Admiral

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USA
621 Posts

Response Posted - 04/10/2008 : 11:40:28

Seems I was a little quick on the trigger, and didn't notice that David had rope-to-wire haylards

which makes the possibility of a jamb-up more likley. But changing to all rope is difinately the fix.

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dmpilc
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
4593 Posts

Response Posted - 04/10/2008 : 12:50:11

I'm fairly sure that the problem occurred when I let one of the newbies raise the main, after all it was a teaching session. I forgot to mention it, and I doubt that he checked for free movement (see-sawing the halyard) before raising the sail or keeping tension on the halyard as it went up. Went out yesterday single-handing her in our Wed. nite club race and didn't have a bit of trouble, except that I was late starting due to having to re-tune the rig.
While I had it down, I looked at the sheaves and they appeared to be okay. however, I'm going to go ahead and order the all-rope sheaves and 5/16" line, and make up an a-frame rig so I'll be ready to make the change out this fall when I lower the mast again. Hope I won't have to do it before then.

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Dave Bristle
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Djibouti
10005 Posts

Response Posted - 04/10/2008 : 14:39:52

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by dmpilc
 ...I doubt that he checked for free movement (see-sawing the halyard) before raising the sail or keeping tension on the halyard as it went up...<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">You can forget all of that when you have all-rope. It hangs over the sheaves better and doesn't get the little bends in it that cause it to jump the sheave--plus there's no space for it to go into.

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stampeder
Master Marine Consultant

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1608 Posts

Response Posted - 04/10/2008 : 16:01:37

I'm going to use my Wire to Rope halyards for this season and will look at replacing with all rope for next season. Now that I know how everything works, and know that my halyard wires are in good shape - I'm content to leave it as designed.

Edited by - on

deastburn
Captain

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USA
334 Posts

Response Posted - 04/12/2008 : 11:26:47

I had the same thing happen when I was new to the C25. It takes very little wear in the sheaves for the wire halyard to jump the sheave and jam. Changing to all rope halyards achieves three things: 1) no more jams, positively; 2) vastly reduced halyard bang and consequent scraping and weakening of the mast; 3) when single-handing and the wind picks up, no more worrying about a halyard jam when lowering the maisail to throw in a reef.

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Steve Milby
Past Commodore

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USA
5909 Posts

Response Posted - 04/12/2008 : 12:05:42

There's one other drawback to wire to rope halliards. The lengths of the wires and the lengths of the ropes are all different. They only work correctly in one combination. If you replace both of them at the same time, and are foolish enough to remove them both without marking them, so that you know which is which, there are many different possible combinations and permutations, and you might have to put your mast up and take it down repeatedly until you get them right. Don't ask me how I know this.

If you change to all rope, you avoid that possibility.

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dmpilc
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
4593 Posts

Response Posted - 04/12/2008 : 17:39:49

If your wire/rope connection is a knotted rope to a wire thimble, it's easy. For each halyard, tie a messenger line to both ends of the wire (shackle on the sail end and thimble on the rope end, untie the old rope, secure the messenger lines to the mast or somewhere else on the boat. Take your old lines to the store and buy new ones, or measure and buy new ones online. When you have the new ropes, reverse the process. Simple and easy, especially if you use different colors.
That being said, I ordered new all rope halyards, 78 ft. each, on Ebay today from Milwaukee Rigging, 5/16" Sta-Set X, green fleck for the main and red fleck for the genoa. Next week I'll order the sheaves from CD.
Having the halyard jam at the top freaked me out a little. building a 12 ft. 2/4 A-frame too. I'll probably make the change-out later this summer.

Edited by - dmpilc on 04/12/2008 17:40:26

dmpilc
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
4593 Posts

Response Posted - 04/14/2008 : 20:37:52

I ordered masthead sheaves today from CD for the wire to all rope halyard conversion. The sheaves were $14.24 EACH, about $60 with shipping!! The halyards, without shackles, will be about $160, so this project is easily going over $200. I was going to do it to the C-22, also, but that one is going to have to wait a while.
I also made an 11' A-frame and 8 ft. mast crutch out of 2x4's, following ideas others on this forum published, that I will use to lower and raise the mast next time. Started out making the A-frame 12' as the boards were when I bought them, but realized I needed to shorten them to 11' first and see how that goes. also, twelve footers are hard to fit in the van, too. I have a 1/2" bolt and 2 snap hook caribiners at the top, and I put eye bolts through each end at the bottom and added a shackle to attach to the forward lower deck fittings. The jib halyard will attach to one of the caribiners, and a block is hanging from the other one. I'll have a single block with becket at the bow, with a 3/8" x 100' line from the becket up to the A-frame block, back down to the bow, then to the cabin-top winch. I hope that will give me enough purchase.

Edited by - dmpilc on 04/14/2008 20:39:31

stampeder
Master Marine Consultant

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Response Posted - 04/14/2008 : 22:11:01

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Started out making the A-frame 12' as the boards were when I bought them, but realized I needed to shorten them to 11' first and see how that goes<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
You will probably have to cut them again. I cut mine down to 9'8".

Edited by - on

dmpilc
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
4593 Posts

Response Posted - 04/15/2008 : 21:53:15

I took the A-frame out to the boat today (no wind for this week's Learning-at-the-Helm) to see how it might fit. The 11' length looks like it will work just fine. With the jib halyard extended as far as the wire thimble will allow, the block at the point of the A-frame is almost directly over the bow. Fully down, it is just long enough to rest on the front of the bow pulpit while I will be attaching the shackles to the forward lower deck fittings. Next step it to put several coats of varnish on them.

Edited by - dmpilc on 04/15/2008 21:54:03

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