New stay and shrouds

[Guest]

I'm just about to replace my thirty year old standing rigging on my DS1. I'm going to 1/8" and am wondering what most racers use for deck fittings on the Lower ends. My current setup has swaged fork ends on both ends of the shrouds, and the same for the upper stay end. The deck end of the stay has a shroud adjuster (forked on each end with multiple holes for different pin placement). I thought I would use adjustable tubular body stainless turnbuckles for the shroud lowers, but not sure about the stay lower fitting. What is the best way to tighten the stay after stepping the mast? How does everyone bend the mast forward after stepping? Magic box? Stay adjuster? Any help on this matter would be appreciated.
Rex Sheler
Michigan

Rex Sheler (signroute-at-aol.com)

[Guest]

Rex, when you refer to the "lower stay end fittings" do you mean on the shrouds, or do you mean the chainplates (deck fittings)? On my boat I have turnbuckles for all standing rigging, forestay and both shrouds, and the turnbuckles are swaged right onto the wire. I have fork terminals to attach the rigging to the mast tangs. My turnbuckles are the same as the original O'Day type (1979 models) and consist of a threaded stud swaged to the wire, and a "U" shaped "body" that the stud goes through, there is a knurled adjustment knob to adjust the tension, and a locknut on top to lock in the adjustment, the U is upside down and as I say, the stud goes through the top and the bottom of the inverted U forms the fork to attach to the chainplate, in addition there is a lage split-ring to prevent the stud from rotating, adjustment is by rotating the knurled knob.
I do not race, but I think that most if any mast bend will come more from the boom-vang than rigging adjustments. I did look up in the Class Association Handbook, and adjustment of the standing rigging during a race is prohibitted, so I'm not sure how "class-legal" a magic-box would be.

Rod Johnson (rjohnson24-at-juno.com)

[Guest]

You mentioned "what is a good way to adjust the tension after stepping the mast?". I was fortunate to have a professional sailboat rigger friend help me in rigging 1/8" wires on my O'day. He used swagged turnbuckles on the side shrouds and installed a toggle tensioning device on the forestay. It works great...with the toggle unlatched there is no tension on the wires but the forestay will still hold the mast in position. When the toggle is levered over and pinned the tension is put on all the wires. This works really well and makes it easy for my daughter to attach the forestay while I hold the mast upright. If interested, I can see if there is a brand and model number on the toggle and get back to you.

Calvin Trotter (calvin.g.trotter-at-saint-gobain.com)

[Guest]

I think "Shafer" makes the one I saw on a 18 foot Hunter last weekend. It had a sailboat with an "S" on the sail stamped on the fitting, but no name. Much easier than wrestling with Forestay tension, pins etc. for we trailer sailers. For the stays they also used "Ronstan" ""clevis pin adjusters" to easily repeat their settings. (I thought they weren't designed to be weight bearing?)

barry (kellbtl-at-aol.com)

[Guest]

Rod,
Adjustment of the "standing" rigging during racing may be illegal but when the racers adjust their rig tension during racing they do it by adjusting the tension of their jib halyard. A magic box is legal in that case. By tightening/loosening the jib halyard you tighten/loosen the whole rig. In order to eliminate problems with the 'rig tensioning' messing up the tesion on the jib cloth the jib luff (cloth) is attached to the halyard only at the head (top). The tack (bottom) of the has a grommet that accepts a shackle. the shackle is attached to a control line with an 8:1 mechanical advantage that leads down through the stem fitting, around a turning block, and aft to a cleat. So then the cloth tension can be adjusted independent of the rig tension.

Jibs utilized in this system may have jib hanks, but they do not support the sail except for raising and lowering the sail.

Keith Bay (kabay-at-execpc.com)