Hunter 376 Running Rigging Fairleads
Dave,
Long story short. My H376 is 1996. Was very hard work raising mainsail and operating vang. Also halyards tended to jam between the rollers (I think).
Weighed my toolbox on fisherman's weighscale (15lb) then attached toolbox to main halyard and hauled toolbox off deck using weighscale on halyard tail where it emerges from under the garage at the rope clutch. Force needed was 2 times to 3 times weight of toolbox.
Did all over again using wife as ballast (120lb!) and much bigger weighscale. Same result.
Removed the rollers and shaft under smoked view panel on deck and then realised halyards never touched underside of it anyway. Also, even if it did become scratched I would never be able to look through that portion of the panel. So did not replace the rollers or shaft which are now on bench in my garage at home.
To get to the roller assembly it was necessary to remove sundry deck panels which also exposed the deck organiser on each side.
Care needed when replacing panel screws because they are self tappers into only top surface of balsa cored deck.
The deck organisers have small sheaves and each turns each rope through two 90° bends. Repeated toolbox lifting/weighscale test at turning block at mast heel and noted large improvement in efficiency. Tried replacing these small (2") sheaves with roller types but not much improvement seen.
So – the deck organisers are wasting most of the pulling power on the halyards.
Next move was to lead main halyard and vang directly from mast heel turning block and directly to line clutches OVER THE DECK. No problems and marked improvement in hauling things.
Amazingly these lines don't bear on anything else (well might just touch but not to wear).
Only then needed to feed them under front flap of my dodger and into the rope clutches.
Been like that this last ten years.
As said before – no problems.
Also did first reefing line as well.
No need to tackle the other lines this way as not so often used and so left them in deck organisers under deck.
