Changing out the spreaders

[Don Crowther]

Ahoy Mates

I've just finished pulling my boat for the winter and this year I brought the mast down as well. Now that the mast is down I see that the spreaders have some cracks in them. I will need to replace these with new ones. I was on the rigrite web site and they show the spreaders that I need.

My question is does anyone know the angle that should be cut for the mount side for the sweep back?

Also it looks like you have to measure the length that you need and order that way. Most of these questions could be answered on Monday when they open but thought I would ask anyway.

Has anyone done this job before?

In case your not sure of the model of my boat it's a Hunter 31 with double spreaders.
Thanks again for all your help
Don

 

[RJ9757]

BF3 Spreaders

You've probably obtained the dimensions by now, but the B&R rig on my '87 H31 used an Isomat mast, with BF-3 spreaders, swept back 30 degrees.

Tuning the rig is a little bit complicated, but actually turned out to be a lot of fun... if you want any of my 'lessons learned' I'm at rickj13@comcast.net

 

[RJ9757]

PS

On the advice of Hunter, I got the spreaders from Charleston spars. The price seemed right, and they were great people to work with.

www.charleston-spar.com

 

[Don Crowther]

Thanks Rick

I called rig-rite and they quoted a price of 239.00 each. Seems a little high to me but I will check with charleston. Also they had no idea what the angle was.
My boat is an hour and a half away but next time I'm down there I will be pulling the spreaders off and doing a close inspection. I wonder if it would be possible to weld the cracks?

 

[RJ9757]

Well....

I can't find the invoice, so I'm not sure, but I think Charleston Spars was considerably cheaper than that, and I figured it was worth the $$ not to have to worry about it. But now that you suggest welding the cracks, it occurs to me that that your solution might work just fine.

The cracks in my spreaders extended about an inch (2.5 cm) or so, and seemed to allow a certain abount of fore-and-aft play in the spreader, but if you can weld anodized aluminum, give it a shot! Mine were also slightly 'mushroomed' at the leading edge near the cracks, probably owing to the motion of the spreaders, but a few minutes with a grinder after you weld the cracks would probably remedy that problem.

I believe the cracks were caused by years of sailing with a badly tuned rig (P.O., of course), but I'm not sure. I think tighter is better, to some extent. I replaced all of my standing rigging last year (that's when I replaced the lower spreaders) and now I've got about 1300 lbs of tension on the forestay (calculated from the inital amount of backstay tension that I applied, prior to tensioning the shrouds), 700 on the upper and lower shrouds, and 550 on the lower intermediates. That seems to prevent slackness on the leeward shrouds in moderate wind conditions, and hopefully will prevent 'pumping' (for lack of a better term) of the rig, which I believe caused the cracks to develop.

Good luck-
Rick

 

[RJ9757]

PSPS

Of course, the 1% pre-bend in the mast itself is very important, so make sure you take your time, tension the diamonds evenly, and keep the mast straight laterally as you apply enough tension to the upper and lower diamonds to achieve a bend of 4.5 inches. The spreaders will be locked into place by the tension on the diamonds.

Cheers-
r

 

[Danu]

Re: PSPS

I had mine welded after reforming the deformed ends. The wleder did a great job giving me enough build up to grind and fair. A little zinc chromide primer and they were good to go.

 

[Nereussailor]

I'd weld them, grind them, and then have them powder coated.

Dave