Hi all,
I have the masts down on my Ingrid 38 Ketch and due to the fact the stainless wire rigging was left sitting on a dirty barge after unstepping the masts I decided to start replacing the standing rigging. The wire rope is 15 years old, but the Norseman fittings (all are eye fittings for clevis pins) are likely from the early 1970s. The wire rope is a mix of 3/8 inch ( Forestays and some main lowers), 5/16 inch (main shrouds and backstay) and 1/4 inch (mizzen). This seems to be oversized from the spec on the sail plan.
I have purchased some 1x19 316 stainless rope and a large amount of Norseman cones from Tylaska who still produces them and have begun replacing the wire starting with forestays and backstays. However I am finding that my Norseman fittings, which include a lock nut on the eye bolt, are not the same as those in the Norseman instructions seen only in photocopied images without text that I can find scattered on the internet. One things the instructions do say is to leave 1 to 1.5x the wire diameter in length at the bitter end of the cone before assembling. I have watched several videos of skilled individuals assembling their Norseman wiring in this manner and after setting the correct cone distance they re-wrap the wires, re-check the distance and effortlessly slide up the female part of the fitting to meet the male threads of the top. On my setup this seems impossible. Try as I might, and I have made 6 ends now, the cone has to move when I slide up the bottom half, because the threads will not otherwise meet. I will lay out all the strands carefully and evenly spaced, twist the bottom fitting in the direction of the wire strands, with great effort, and eventually the two halves will just barely meet enough that I can screw them together. At this point the cone has moved and is 50% nearer to the end. Once the threads are engaged, things go as planned and the Norseman compresses the wires down nicely against the cone. However at this point if I check the cone distance to the end it is at best 0.75x the wire diameter, rather than the recommended numbers above.
On checking my pre-existing cones I see the same situation or worse, those are almost touching the end honestly. As an aside the good thing about the old fittings is that at 15 years I see no corrosion and they have been bedded in what appears and smells to be regular silicon sealant. So that may be a win for the argument of to seal or not to seal.
So my question is, has anyone worked with this older generation of Norseman fittings (the ones having the locknut)? Is there a different spec for cone spacing on those old Norsemans from the currently documented ones and the ones people have demonstrated on Youtube? I just want to know if I've done these right and if the reason for changing the design and spec was due to some problem with this older design.
As Norseman fittings are no longer manufactured, it is clearly difficult to find this information. It would cost me several thousand to convert to Sta-Loc or Hi-Mod, but I want to have a strong rig for the Pacific Northwest.
Any advice appreciated!
I have the masts down on my Ingrid 38 Ketch and due to the fact the stainless wire rigging was left sitting on a dirty barge after unstepping the masts I decided to start replacing the standing rigging. The wire rope is 15 years old, but the Norseman fittings (all are eye fittings for clevis pins) are likely from the early 1970s. The wire rope is a mix of 3/8 inch ( Forestays and some main lowers), 5/16 inch (main shrouds and backstay) and 1/4 inch (mizzen). This seems to be oversized from the spec on the sail plan.
I have purchased some 1x19 316 stainless rope and a large amount of Norseman cones from Tylaska who still produces them and have begun replacing the wire starting with forestays and backstays. However I am finding that my Norseman fittings, which include a lock nut on the eye bolt, are not the same as those in the Norseman instructions seen only in photocopied images without text that I can find scattered on the internet. One things the instructions do say is to leave 1 to 1.5x the wire diameter in length at the bitter end of the cone before assembling. I have watched several videos of skilled individuals assembling their Norseman wiring in this manner and after setting the correct cone distance they re-wrap the wires, re-check the distance and effortlessly slide up the female part of the fitting to meet the male threads of the top. On my setup this seems impossible. Try as I might, and I have made 6 ends now, the cone has to move when I slide up the bottom half, because the threads will not otherwise meet. I will lay out all the strands carefully and evenly spaced, twist the bottom fitting in the direction of the wire strands, with great effort, and eventually the two halves will just barely meet enough that I can screw them together. At this point the cone has moved and is 50% nearer to the end. Once the threads are engaged, things go as planned and the Norseman compresses the wires down nicely against the cone. However at this point if I check the cone distance to the end it is at best 0.75x the wire diameter, rather than the recommended numbers above.
On checking my pre-existing cones I see the same situation or worse, those are almost touching the end honestly. As an aside the good thing about the old fittings is that at 15 years I see no corrosion and they have been bedded in what appears and smells to be regular silicon sealant. So that may be a win for the argument of to seal or not to seal.
So my question is, has anyone worked with this older generation of Norseman fittings (the ones having the locknut)? Is there a different spec for cone spacing on those old Norsemans from the currently documented ones and the ones people have demonstrated on Youtube? I just want to know if I've done these right and if the reason for changing the design and spec was due to some problem with this older design.
As Norseman fittings are no longer manufactured, it is clearly difficult to find this information. It would cost me several thousand to convert to Sta-Loc or Hi-Mod, but I want to have a strong rig for the Pacific Northwest.
Any advice appreciated!