Association Forum - Halyard questions

Assn Members Area · Join

Home.

Association Forum

Ships Store

Cruising

Racing

Technical Tips

Photo Gallery - New

Boat Search - Updated

Manuals & Brochures

Swap Meet

Links

Officer Flag Line & Staff

Bylaws & Constitution

Members Area

Join the Association

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.

Association Forum

Username:	Password:
Save Password
Forgot your Password?

All Forums

Catalina/Capri 25/250 Sailor's Forums

Catalina 25 Specific Forum

Halyard questions

New Topic

Topic Locked

Printer Friendly

Author

Topic

lancej
1st Mate

Member Avatar

81 Posts

Initially Posted - 06/17/2004 : 14:17:15

Rope to wire halyards, who needs them?

How many people are using rope to wire halyards still? How many have changed. If you have changed, did you change sheeves as well?

Thanks,
Lance
85 FK/SR

Edited by - on

Frank Hopper
Past Commodore

Members Avatar

Pitcairn Island
6776 Posts

Response Posted - 06/17/2004 : 14:50:29

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by lancej
 Rope to wire halyards, who needs them?

How many people are using rope to wire halyards still? How many have changed. If you have changed, did you change sheeves as well?

Thanks,
Lance
85 FK/SR
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
Please do a search, you will find a lot of discussion on this. I changed to 75' of 1/4" halyard from Layline.com with Belpat (see the links page) marine sheaves. My halyards are led back on the cabin top, I stayed external. If you go internal you can use fewer, larger sheaves and larger line. My only issues are that the 1/4" rope fits the sheaves wonderfully but the cover is slick and it often takes four wraps on the winches to get adequate tension in high winds, and that is with serious "gloves on" tailing.

Edited by - on

Dave Laux
Captain

Members Avatar

318 Posts

Response Posted - 06/17/2004 : 18:15:37

I am using 5/16 regular Samson dacron with the internal set up that is standard for late boats. I have replaced all of the sheaves in the mast head, the exit blocks, and the deck turning blocks with Schafer or Harken ball bearing scheaves, They seem to work well. I also rebuilt the traveller with ball bearing scheaves. Sounds good, little click click as it goes over. Rope to wire is a pain. Dave

Edited by - on

ClamBeach
Master Marine Consultant

Members Avatar

3072 Posts

Response Posted - 06/17/2004 : 20:32:53

Highly recommend this conversion. I changed out to all-line halyards, and have never looked back.

I used 5/16" x 65' pre-spliced halyards purchased from sailnet.com. They work fine (I'm not a rabid racer) and are plenty long for a standard rig C25. The halyards are led aft through a double line clutch mounted just in front of the cabintop winch.

-- bb

Edited by - on

RichardG
Admiral

Members Avatar

USA
990 Posts

Response Posted - 06/17/2004 : 21:30:54

There may not be many left, but I still have a rope-to-wire main halyard. I haven't changed it out because it's still in good shape and works fine for my needs. The only time I lost the end up the mast, completely unrelated to the halyard being wire-rope, was when the snap shackle popped open (probably was not completely closed) when I started to haul up the main (lines not led aft). Fortunately, I stopped mid-yank and the end quickly became tangled at the spreader -- was able to pull it down with a bungy-cord hook taped to the boat hook (not easy in the chop).

Edited by - on

joe keith
1st Mate

Members Avatar

USA
26 Posts

Response Posted - 06/17/2004 : 23:12:19

I have also changed mine out. I went with the parts from Catalina Direct. Changed the sheaves, added the blocks at the bottom of the mast, added a second jib halyard and went internal. I didn't like the meat hooks on the old halyards and also wanted a second jib halyard.

Edited by - on

Brooke Willson
Admiral

Members Avatar

USA
983 Posts

Response Posted - 06/18/2004 : 08:45:48

I converted to all rope this Spring -- less friction, less danger of the shackle getting loose and going to the masthead, etc. I figure the fewer splices/knots/thimbles/swages in the equation, the more reliable the system is.

Brooke

Edited by - Brooke Willson on 06/18/2004 08:46:28

lancej
1st Mate

Members Avatar

81 Posts

Response Posted - 06/18/2004 : 08:59:07

Thanks for all the input....I am going to purchase new halyards for my "around the Great Lakes" cruise later this year. I think I will go to all line halyards, but I really don't want to drop the mast! The boat is on it's cradle right now, and it's already 8 feet to the deck.

To this end, the local shop here reccomended leaving the sheaves as they are and using a 8mm line stripped to the core to decrease the diameter, effictivly simulating the rope to wire, but without the wire. Seems to me like this would sacrafice the strength of the line, but he says it will not, as he will use a super low stretch super high strength line. What this actually means is $2.29 a foot.

Does this sound like a good/bad idea to anyone?

Thanks,
Lance
85 FK/SR

Edited by - on

Derek Crawford
Master Marine Consultant

Members Avatar

USA
3324 Posts

Response Posted - 06/18/2004 : 09:27:29

Lance - I've just replaced my halyards and wanted to keep the same sheaves. I used 3/16" V-12 (vectran) center spliced into a 5/16" tail. They run perfectly in the sheaves. I had appropriate shackles spliced into the V-12.
The V-12 3/16" has a breaking strength of 4600 lbs (over twice that of the old wire!).
Derek

Edited by - on

Dave Bristle
Master Marine Consultant

Members Avatar

Djibouti
10005 Posts

Response Posted - 06/18/2004 : 13:20:50

To lead them back to the cockpit, I went all-rope, external, 5/16ths, and put in Belpat's sheaves. I should mention that when I replace the sheaves, the originals were cracked and slightly jagged (probably from 15 years of sun) and would not have been kind to new lines, especially if they were a little tight in the sheaves. Derek's solution is elegant (as one would expect), but new sheaves are simpler and cheaper, and you have the option of reversing the halyards later.

Edited by - on

Mark Maxwell
Captain

Members Avatar

USA
329 Posts

Response Posted - 06/22/2004 : 09:31:47

Hello Lance, the type of rope with a braided core and an outer sleave is called Kern Mantle and it is true that the sleave (mantle) accounts for only 25% of the total strength. However, I would shy away from this approach. If the mantle is allowed to just slide back and forth on the line it will begin to slack in areas allowing the core to push through causing problems at the running end.

The best way to do this type of 2 sized line is as Derek discribed. Have a smaller line spliced to the larger one. This keeps the mantle in place and allows both sections to share the load properly.

I would not hesitate to lower your mast....even at 8' above the ground. A couple of things to consider here are that if you use the old sheeves they may be cracked as Dave's were (mine too were cracked I think it's pretty common for our non metal type sheeves) also the area of the masthead casting where the rope enters and exits can also abraide the new rope and may need to be filed down.

If you do decide to change the sheeves this too will need to be done on the ground. The SS pins that hold the sheeves can be corroded to the masthead and require carefull methods to remove them. I had to do this on mine and in that process I still cracked the masthead.

Where are you located? Any other sailors (any make of boat) there with mast lowering experience should be able to help you with that. 3 people can easily handle it.

With all that said, switching to all rope halyards is worth the work. Hope this helps.

Edited by - Mark Maxwell on 06/22/2004 09:33:20

Topic

New Topic

Topic Locked

Printer Friendly

Jump To:

Association Forum

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.