Flat traveler support for C27/C30?

[PSR]

A C30 arrived at my dock a couple of weeks ago, and she's thoroughly equipped. Yesterday I noticed the towers supporting the aftermarket flat traveler:

The traveler supports appear to be aluminum and fitted to make use of the original teak supports.

Does anyone know of a source for these? I would use them for my C27 rather than new stainless towers to reduce the problem of new holes in the cabin top. The main downside seems to be the need for quite long bolts, and I have found that suitable long 316 SS bolts are not so easy to find.

Best to all!
Peter

 

[Stu Jackson]

That looks like a "one-off" design. Maybe he has a brother-in-law who has a metal shop!

In any event you NEED to drill through and firmly connect the traveler track to the cabintop. There is NO getting around this. Many years ago Jim Moe, a C-30 and C-34 owner reported in Mainsheet magazine that the tracks could pull out because the factory only installed one bolt each side into the backing plates in the fiberglass. He included pictures of a ripped out traveler track. You do NOT want that to happen to you.

IIRC, I bought them from Catalina Yachts. You could call and ask. Or try McMaster Carr, they seem to have everything.

Good luck.

 

[PSR]

Thanks for the reply. It is pretty obvious that there must be multiple bolts through the cabin top. Maybe I seemed to imply something about not using those bolts when I mentioned the long bolts as a downside. What I meant was that using the usual replacement towers for the flat track more or less like this:

the bolts would be short, or at least an easily obtainable normal length. I would just like to include the original bolt holes in the installation rather than adding more, and that would be possible with the setup on that C30.

In the C30 installation I showed, the tower extenders appear to have been installed with threaded rod instead of bolts, which solves the problem of finding adequately long bolts.

The problem of long screws/bolts is on my mind because I am replacing the old deck organizer on my boat's cabin top with a new one from Schaefer. The Schaefer deck organizer has sheaves on bushings on 4" 1/4-20 SS Phillips round head machine screws. On my boat the fitting has to be on a riser to allow clearance to the winch between handrail and hatch cover. With the riser in place and the thickness of the cabin top there, I need 6" machine screws or bolts. Rod with nut and acorn nut would stick up in a bad place for moving around on the deck, unlike the ends of the rod in the C30 install. It is fairly easy to find 6" 18-8 SS 1/4-20 screws or bolts, but not the same in 316 stainless. At Jamestown Distr. the support guy said, All the guys around here use 18-8 stainless-the other stuff is too expensive." I guess I do not need to do "better" than all those guys. After all, I probably won't last long enough to see the bolts corrode, even if the boat does.... Still, I like to do things the best I can, and 316 is better than 18-8 stainless for marine use.

This discussion is all moot, though, given this replacement setup from Catalina Direct for the C30:

It installs on top of the original teak risers, and it looks like a possible fit to the C27 also. If you are interested, I'll let you know.