Notice:
The advice given on this site is based upon individual or quoted experience, yours may differ.
The Officers, Staff and members of this site only provide information based upon the concept that anyone utilizing this information does so at their own risk and holds harmless all contributors to this site.
Yesterday I dropped the mast with an A-frame I rigged up. I needed to replace the anchor light and figure out why the steaming light wasn't steaming, so to speak. After a few hours with an electricity-savvy friend trying to trace the old wiring with an multimeter (with varying results) I decided to just make a new beginning and replacing everything with the CD wiring harness I had on hand.
All the lights work as should now and I am happy.
However, upon raising the mast we were so intent on watching up above for fouling lines and shrouds and stays that we totally failed to see that the toggles on the upper shrouds were twisted, not in line, and they bent terribly. I can easily replace them and replace the barrel turnbuckles. In fact, a friendly Catalina 27 owner gave me his spares to use until I get some new ones (Catalina onwers for you.)
My question is: This obviously put a strain on the upper shrouds. Despite everything looking okay (except for the poor toggles and toggle bolts) is it possible that I damaged the shrouds or the upper end fork swages? I don't mind spending the money - indeed, I had been considering replacing the standing rigging - but I would rather not drop the mast again. Just pissed at myself for not noticing the obvious.
I suspect I'd want to drop the mast again and check the spreaders and the swages--top and bottom. (Crimped cable at the edge of the bottom swage is not a good thing--nor obviously is any evidence of the cable pulling out.) If all appears to be well and you've replaced the bent toggles, put 'er up again, go sailing, and order your standing rigging for this winter. Catalina Direct's set comes with open-body bronze turnbuckles (greatly preferable to SS barrels) and is generally hard to beat. You didn't mention the vintage of your boat, and I'm guessing you're in fresh water, but if the standing rigging is original, it's past due at 20++ years.
The same thing just happened to me. I bought all new standing rigging for the boat and we went to raise the mast and the two upper shroud toggles bent pretty easily. I was really surprised. I replaced them with two from my old shrouds that look much more beefy than the new ones. The new ones looked pretty small. Something we now keep a few extras on hand...
Notice: The advice given on this site is based upon individual or quoted experience, yours may differ. The Officers, Staff and members of this site only provide information based upon the concept that anyone utilizing this information does so at their own risk and holds harmless all contributors to this site.