Where to find T-Ball Eye for CDI furler install

[isaksp00]

My H23 ('91, I believe the last year it was made?) has a forestay with an eye terminal at the top, and a mast fitting with the matching clevis pin. I assume these fittings can be purchased. So another option for people who can't find a T-ball terminal may be to replace the mast socket with one that has a clevis pin and use the eye terminal. I happen to have a swageless fitting, if I recall I bought a Hayn, as I had damage to my Harken furler connectors that forced me to cut the stay and install a new one.

 

[Crazy Dave Condon]

Isaksp00
Yes the forestay for the 23.5 and 23 can be purchased from Seco South in Tampa. Ask for Jean. They use to m ake all the standing rigging for Hunter for many years for all of the boats until Selden came into the picture.

As for the one failure previously mentioned, if the rigging is loose not being properly tuned then I can see any failure happening as I repaired and replaced masts when I was a dealer. If you buy the forestay from Seco South, no need to cut that new forestay.

 

[jbreland]

ok guys now you have me completely confused. I started the other thread
https://forums.sailboatowners.com/i...r-26-and-cdi-ff2-install.192244/#post-1467666
asking if you need the toggle at the top of the forestay, as mentioned in the CDI manual and most including Dave said you needed it.
Now in this thread I'm getting conflicting reports that say the t-ball fitting at the top is sufficient.
please someone clear this up, because I've already bought my forestay (twice I might add) from Seco South
and told them It was for a CDI furler install and was never mentioned I needed the toggle....
at the time I had not purchased the CDI furler.
I'm trying to decide now if I need it or not ???? please help ????

 

[PropellerHead]

The manufacturer had weighed in on this thread as to the question of the upper toggle. That closes the issue for me. There's still the question of the correct length for the luff extrusion which I believe is to long when going by the manual.

 

[Ron20324]

ok guys now you have me completely confused. I started the other thread
https://forums.sailboatowners.com/i...r-26-and-cdi-ff2-install.192244/#post-1467666
asking if you need the toggle at the top of the forestay, as mentioned in the CDI manual and most including Dave said you needed it.
Now in this thread I'm getting conflicting reports that say the t-ball fitting at the top is sufficient.
please someone clear this up, because I've already bought my forestay (twice I might add) from Seco South
and told them It was for a CDI furler install and was never mentioned I needed the toggle....
at the time I had not purchased the CDI furler.
I'm trying to decide now if I need it or not ???? please help ????

Well, it's what you get on this forum- many opinions a fewsfact of life. And the OPs can never extract the correct proceedure. Non-furler forestays may well survive with just the t-ball. But add the weight of the furler and the sail, and yotu have weight going to and fro. It should be prety dasic knowledge that a harder item will wear away a softer piece (ball or mast). Your forestay supplier is not likely to engineer your system for you. They send what you ask for. Seems to me you mentioned you needed the toggle in the OP.

 

[Crazy Dave Condon]

Anyone with a 23.5, please take a photo where the t ball fitting fits into the mast. If I recall there is a stainless steel fitting riveted onto the mast that the t ball fitting goes in to. Not sure which is why I am asking.

 

[Ron20324]

Anyone with a 23.5, please take a photo where the t ball fitting fits into the mast. If I recall there is a stainless steel fitting riveted onto the mast that the t ball fitting goes in to. Not sure which is why I am asking.

There should be!

 

[PropellerHead]

 

[Dennis Kitchen]

Propellorhead,
I have a 23.5 on which I installed a CDI FF2 furler. I kept the T-ball fitting on the top of the fore-stay. Although , as you stated; the manual says to have a toggle at the top, my supplier and many other installers have done with out this so I concluded I would do this with a careful eye on wear at each stepping of the mast. Now we've had a CDI representative respond on this thread and say that's OK and that the manual is going to be changed. Case closed.

Still you should know: When raising or lowering mast the fore-stay/furler will sag under it's own weight and when you try to remove the t-ball fitting from the mast you must be careful to not kink the fore-stay! I made my luff extrusion as tall as possible for a full hoist sail so I only have a couple inches of slack cable at the top. I twist the cable in the direction of the lay as I make the bend carefully to remove t-ball. This prevents kinking. In three seasons I've seen no wear or broken wires and I sail it hard.

What unit are you installing? For my FF2 the manual says to get the luff foil length, reduce the pin to pin length by 12.25 inches. That is enough as the furler slides down over the turn-buckle. Remember to only cut off at the top; never the bottom where the sail luff opening is. If you make the luff extrusion too tall the halyard exit on the luff cap will strike the sheave box on the mast. If too short your sail luff will be un-supported of course.
H235JIB.pdf

The 12.25 inches comes from the chart dimensions J + H + (G-F) =___. Again, you may have to add and inch or so to dimension H so the luff cap does not strike the sheave box. (see .pdf)


Do I think a toggle at the top would be better? Yes I do because it would make raising and lowering the mast easier with out kinking the fore-stay. I may even replace my t-ball socket with the Z-spar combi box so I have a pin for the forestay instead and some extra halyard exits and sheaves.

Good luck. The furler is the second best mod I've made to my boat. I love it!

 

[PropellerHead]

Interesting diagram. It shows 2 inches from the top pin to the top of the furler. The T-Ball fitting is 4.5 inches. This is what I ended up with and obviously won't work. I get the impression that the directions are intended for a really short top fitting.

 

[Dennis Kitchen]

PR,
Yes you are right so like I said add some length to H. Measure your sail luff and compute all the dimensions to verify your fit for a correct luff length and then you too can have a furler just like thousands of other sailors with a CDI furler. I applaud you for your caution and desire to do it right. However, don't let this deter you. We have shown you the way. Think it through, choose your solution and press on! Look at my mast top photo and you'll see how it should look. If you choose a different furler you'll still have to solve for the t-ball issue. I realize and agree it's a little more complicated than expected but you can do it!
Dennis

 

[PropellerHead]

Dennis: It may seem like I'm obsessing over this but with all the diagrams and detailed measurements, I just couldn't get my head around the whole thing ending with 'just trim a little more till it looks right'. They could have saved allot of heart burn by just summing up the whole thing with: "Trim the luff extrusion until the assembled furler leaves you with something close to X inches of free cable at the top". It's what I ended up doing and it looks more or less like yours.

BTW: Can you elaborate on what the "Z-Spar Combi Box" Is that something like the Mast Hound I posted?

 

[isaksp00]

I think Dennis means something like these below. My 23 has something like it, which contains a plastic sheave for the halyard (I have a Harken furler that lacks an internal halyard, that is, different from the CDI). It also has holes for a clevis pin, and that is what the eye terminal at the top of the stay attaches to. On the Harken furler, they want the top of the extrusion and its rubber cap to be pretty close to the top end of the stay; since it does not have the sheave for the internal halyard that the CDI has, it won't bind on the sheave fitting. Normally you'd have a swaged top eye terminal that is maybe 4 or 5 inches long, and the extrusion top goes above the bottom end of the terminal, so the extrusion plastic cap is swiveling around the eye shaft, not the stay wire. Since I used a shorter swageless mechanical eye, the plastic cap is on the wire about an inch below the bottom of the eye. I only mention this, as that approach may work for the CDI as well. I did add a toggle, just to make it a bit easier to lower the mast without kinking.

 

[PropellerHead]

I wondered too about the top of the furler spinning in the wire instead of the fitting shaft. No way around it without adding the toggle though.

 

[Dennis Kitchen]

PR,
Believe me I hear what you're saying as I spent hours checking and re-checking but I had the added drama of trying to decide how long a luff I should have on my new sail that I made at the same time which I wanted to be full hoist. If you have a stock sail your luff will be shorter than the luff extrusion by several inches so really its like you said, just give your foil clearance at the t-ball and sheave and you're golden. Your sail luff length is the one variable that CDI can't account for so they have to give you the tools to do the math for your own application.
For a combi box look at isaksp00 's post and see PN 3283.
Dennis

 

[isaksp00]

On my Harken, it is the plastic cap that spins on the wire, at least, as long as that cap hasn't broken or worn out. Even with the toggle, if the cap broke, the top of my extrusion (which is aluminum on the Harken, where I think the CDI is plastic?) would rub on the wire below the fitting, since the toggle goes above the terminal. The toggle just gives the stay more freedom of movement as you raise or lower the mast. I had the wire at the bottom of the furler show some grooving since the aluminum edge of the extrusion was rubbing. I replaced the wire and glued a nylon spacer about an inch long inside the bottom of the extrusion, which seems to be working based on one season. If I ever have to remove the wire again I will do the same at the top. One of the spacers at Home Depot fit well.

 

[DJN51]

Did this to my 23.5 takes stain off t-ball fitting

Had new forestay made as length changed with fitting