To Toggle or not to Toggle

justsomeguy · Sep 10, 2015

KenG said:
Was having my morning Hunterowners fix this morning when I read CHSN WND's post about buying a CDI furler and Justsomeguy posted the CDI manual.
The reason is, my wife and I took our Hunter 26 to Lake Superior in August and 6 days into a 2 week sail and about 5 miles off shore we unfurled the jib and the stay broke at the top sending the sail into the lake and my wife and I frantically getting a line forward to keep the mast from coming down, we did that successfully and motored 5 hours into Rossport Ontario put the boat on the trailer and ended our holiday. The rigging on the boat is original 1995.
So, the new stay showed up this week and I started to put the boat back together in the driveway when I looked on the CDI manual and it states Toggles need to be on both ends of the forestay.
I have never had a toggle on my stay were it connects to the mast, it is just the regular T. Do I need one?

It depends on how much articulation your setup allows at the fixing points, and how often you inspect (i.e.- drop the mast).

CDI has to cover its backside on this.

Jackdaw · Sep 10, 2015

KenG said:
Was having my morning Hunterowners fix this morning when I read CHSN WND's post about buying a CDI furler and Justsomeguy posted the CDI manual.
The reason is, my wife and I took our Hunter 26 to Lake Superior in August and 6 days into a 2 week sail and about 5 miles off shore we unfurled the jib and the stay broke at the top sending the sail into the lake and my wife and I frantically getting a line forward to keep the mast from coming down, we did that successfully and motored 5 hours into Rossport Ontario put the boat on the trailer and ended our holiday. The rigging on the boat is original 1995.
So, the new stay showed up this week and I started to put the boat back together in the driveway when I looked on the CDI manual and it states Toggles need to be on both ends of the forestay.
I have never had a toggle on my stay were it connects to the mast, it is just the regular T. Do I need one?

Without a doubt, YES.

A toggle allows the forestay to flex at its ends in any direction due to the dual axis pins. This prevents that flex stress from being borne by the fittings, which will eventually break.

woodster · Sep 10, 2015

just sitting here reading this and it occurred to me if one had a halyard restrainer at the top of the mast it would/might prevent the sail and foil from going in the water although it would in no way act as secure way to hold the mast without backup and this would all be dependant on whether it was the toggle or the stay cable that broke am i seeing this correctly

Stu Jackson · Sep 10, 2015

KenG said:
....when I looked on the CDI manual and it states Toggles need to be on both ends of the forestay..........I have never had a toggle on my stay were it connects to the mast, it is just the regular T. Do I need one?

RTFM? F stands for Funny.

Really, why'd ya think they wrote that?

Jack's right.

It could well be the reason why you had that failure. Only that it took 20 years...

Sorry to hear about it, but glad you acted properly and got back safely.

Crazy Dave Condon · Sep 10, 2015

Post a photo of what you have so I can take a look. I knew the fellow who started CDI and got Hunter to offer them as a add on. you can email me via forum email.

Jackdaw · Sep 10, 2015

woodster said:
just sitting here reading this and it occurred to me if one had a halyard restrainer at the top of the mast it would/might prevent the sail and foil from going in the water although it would in no way act as secure way to hold the mast without backup and this would all be dependant on whether it was the toggle or the stay cable that broke am i seeing this correctly

You're thinking that the luff of the sail supported by the halyard can help keep the mast up if the rig is not powered up. Yes.

On most brands of furlers, yes, but NOT with a CDI. The CDI relies on an internal halyard, so the boats regular jib halyard is not used. This is rather innovative as it keeps costs down. It eliminates the top swivel and greatly simplifies the bottom drum. But you take a performance hit for sure because you cannot adjust halyard tension while sailing.

Crazy Dave Condon · Sep 11, 2015

Ken;

Your boat was designed specifically for a trailer sailor as most folks prefer to pleasure sail than for real racing. The CDI furler does have the internal halyard which Jackdaw advised not best suited for racing but for pleasure sailing, yes. However, there was another advantage of the CDI furler which I advocated this system as a dealer.

Eliminating time to make ready for sail or tear down was important why the boat came with its own mast raise system. Most furlers at that time had a metal extrusion which one had to be very careful not bending or it would be broken and the jib had to be removed to use the supplied mast raise system. Therefore, as a dealer I became aware of the CDI systems FF1 and FF2 when they came out which helped to eliminate time taking the mast up or down which is important to many if trailering a lot. First the CDI furler extrusion is flexible as it was not made out of metal, so the concern of breaking it diminished near to zero and easier to secure. As for the internal halyard, it allowed the jib if a Sunbrella shade cover was applied could be left on the furler when trailering if secured properly. This eliminated a lot of time which is why I sold many of them on many major brands. I found that the serious racer preferred the other furlers which I concur with Jackdaw but the most sailors prefer what I called the pleasure sailing not seriously for racing. I wanted to let you know why I advocated the CDI Systems. Later, other manufactures started coming out with their own style flexible furlers in a sense. It is called competition.

Jackdaw · Sep 11, 2015

KenG said:
Thank you everyone for replying. This site is a great source of knowledge.
I think Jackdaw has answered my question with his last post. The CDI furler does rely on the internal halyard which is the 3/16th cable, there is no adjusting it while you are sailing. So I believe I am OK to keep using the same set up that has been on the boat since 1995.
Thanks again.

To be perfectly clear, the internal halyard design of the CDI furler has no bearing whatsoever on the necessity of a 2-axis toggle at the mast fitting. Not having one will put your rig at risk.