Hunter 23 wing keel mast raising system

Brian M H23 · Sep 20, 2023

@Crazy Dave Condon I don't have the boat anymore, but I remember quite a lot about the system I used!

I throughbolted eyes to the deck, lining the pivots up with the rear pin. If i recall about 18" to each side.
Ran short wire stays from these eyes to the mast.

Made a roller using an old bow roller and 2x4 with some brackets to the rudder pins

I would take the mainsheet to the jib halyard and clear the jib halyard off on the mast.

roll back and get the bottom pinned - the wire side stays prevent the mast from tipping off the back

Check all rigging (I got rid of the CDI furler to make the forestay more manageable)

From cockpit, raise mast to your shoulder and start hauling on the mainsheet. It went up pretty easy.
at some point I would stop hauling the sheet, finsh tipping it up by hand, take all the slack out of the jib halyard, then haul the mainsheet tight

Mainsheet has enough leverage to prestress the shrouds and pin the forestay. back it off and done!

isaksp00 · Sep 20, 2023

I used a home made system but not A frame. Kind of complicated, but used an aluminum tube gin pole. I made these things that were strapped down to the molded gunwale, out of two by fours, that let me position a good sized eye bolt on each side at the same level as, and directly to the side of, the mast tabernacle hinge pin. That let me attach wire rope "baby stays" to a chain looped around the mast that was raised to just below the spreaders. Since the lower end of the baby stays was attached in a line pretty level with the hinge the stays stayed about the same tension as the mast changed angle. It helped (though wasn't really solid enough to rely on without a person to help) prevent the mast from swaying sideways - that's really easy to happen when the mast is about halfway up.

Hunter 23 wing keel mast raising system

Crazy Dave Condon

.

Brian M H23

.

isaksp00

.