Thanks to the forum participants that posted suggestions several days ago about methods to lead a new halyard over and through the mast by joining it with the old halyard.
I've had now a couple of day's sailing with the new halyard. The previous rope was a tired 9/16" line probably from numerous rope generations ago. The new is 3/8" line called VPC by New England ropes. (Happened upon a super good price at West Marine's website last week which couldn't pass up.) VPC doesn't quite match the specs of the real high-end + big $'s stuff, but stretch and breaking numbers are very much better than the more "performance recreational" grades like STA-set and STA-set X.
I'm sure its no surprise to sailing veterens, but several immediately noticed benefits:
- Smaller diameter, and much less stiffness (compared to my old halyard) seems to have reduced friction from bending around the sheaves? The sail practically flew up the 42' boom to mast top distance by hauling manually. And the sail falls back down at the end of the outing without needing to down-pull on the luff, except for the last few feet.
- Less stretch = much less scalloping along the mainsail's luff as the day's sail time progressed. 25-30 kts wind.
After installing new halyard line, plus "milking" out about 8" along the mainsail's shrunken bolt rope, my older mainsail is actually drawing very nicely now. My impulse to get new sails is now diminished ... for a few years anyway.
rardi
I've had now a couple of day's sailing with the new halyard. The previous rope was a tired 9/16" line probably from numerous rope generations ago. The new is 3/8" line called VPC by New England ropes. (Happened upon a super good price at West Marine's website last week which couldn't pass up.) VPC doesn't quite match the specs of the real high-end + big $'s stuff, but stretch and breaking numbers are very much better than the more "performance recreational" grades like STA-set and STA-set X.
I'm sure its no surprise to sailing veterens, but several immediately noticed benefits:
- Smaller diameter, and much less stiffness (compared to my old halyard) seems to have reduced friction from bending around the sheaves? The sail practically flew up the 42' boom to mast top distance by hauling manually. And the sail falls back down at the end of the outing without needing to down-pull on the luff, except for the last few feet.
- Less stretch = much less scalloping along the mainsail's luff as the day's sail time progressed. 25-30 kts wind.
After installing new halyard line, plus "milking" out about 8" along the mainsail's shrunken bolt rope, my older mainsail is actually drawing very nicely now. My impulse to get new sails is now diminished ... for a few years anyway.
rardi