Early in the morning I went and cleaned up the roller furling unit and scrubbed the bird shit and pine sap off it from it being stored in pattys back yard for the last year and a half. Soapy water and a kitchen pad was good for the bird poop but it needed a stainless scraper to get the pine sap off. It looked much better for being scrubbed. I also went up and down the length cleaning out the to luff slots on the foil and ran water at pressure through the length of the furler to wash as much grit and dust out as I could. I then attached the furler and neatened up all halyards, lines and shrouds so it would be ready to carry to the boat and mount. I also sprayed the length of the slots with mclube sail kote.
About 1 or 2 a-clock richard met me and breck down at the dock and we stepped the mast Ok this part was a bear… normally putting the mast up isn’t that bad on sea puppy.. however we had only done it on the trailer which is a fairly steady platform compared to sitting in the slip. When we took the mast down we almost dropped it when the boat wobbled under us. Talk about a heart stopping moment.. So keeping that in mind richard and I went out to his shed and got a couple of 20 ft lengths of 3 inch? maybe 4 inch PVC pipe that he had bolted together at one end and had lines run on to make a A Frame for putting masts up and down on his boat flimys flier. It sounds easy in concept but proved a bit harder in execution.
So the the legs go one on each side of the boat forward of the chainplates and get tied to the toe rails. then using a line run forward to the bow and bringing it back the the winch aft the A-frame is lifted up to just past vertical. The two big lines attached to the top of the aframe are led aft two to blocks on the toe rail and tied off at the jib sheet winches. So picture it an A stradling the boat with one line leading to the bow and two leading back on either side of the boat. At th apex of the a frame is a block with a line coming down that will be tied to the mast just under the spreaders and used to lift the mast up.
This is the theory and actually how we did it the second time around. The first time the port leg slipped and the a-frame fell as we were putting it up..(just the a-frame .. the mast wasn’t on the boat yet, thank GOD! ) Did I say already that I was the one on that side pushing up on that leg to help raise the a-frame. Did I mention that I had my wallet, knife, PHONE, and keys in my pockets. Next did I mention that as it fell it carried me over the side of the boat and into the harbor with it? Ahh I guess I forgot to mention that… So here I am going Oh Shitttt! as it drags me over the side. I’m thinking “damn the second phone for flounders this year” I’m also scrambling like crazy to grab something .. anything.. to keep from going all the way in the water and save the phone. The only thing to grab is the a-frame which is still attached to the boat with the end dangling over and into the water…I grabbed it and splash hit the water and just as quick was climbing it like a monkey. I got most of me out of the water in a fraction of a second.. not quick enough to avoid being totally soaked but quick enough it turned out that the phone didn’t get more than surface wet. I’m hanging there upside down by one hand digging my phone out with the other going .. someone grab this will you… ohh and just behind me my check book is floating away…. This all happend quick.. Breck and Richard are still running across the boat to see if im ok worried that I have been injured.. When they get there, I am hanging out upside down from the fallen a-frame half in the water with my phone in my hand. I guess it was a pretty funny sight. lol. the phone survived.. no damage was done to the boat or me..
After that we got the a-frame up and tied down.. then eased the mast down from the bulk head over the dock and out over the boat and under the a-frame.. Using the line and block at the top of the a-frame we tied it to the mast just under the spreaders and then used the main halyard winch to lift it up and hold it in place as we stepped it and attached the shrouds, forstay and backstay.. Big problem… the roller furling unit is supposed to have a little U shapped terminal between the chainplate and the forstay fitting.. It doesn’t use the plates that the normal forstay uses. for now we just left the roller furling unit resting on the deck and used the jib halyard as a temporary forstay. Richard got out his circular saw with the metal cutting blade and we cut down the stainless adjusting plates that the stock forstay uses to adjust rake. We installed this and it seemed to work.
Oh one major fubar during all this. The pin that holds the mast base to the mounting plate on the cabin top went missing. I set it somewhere safe after taking the mast down and when looking for it with the mast hanging there spent 20 minutes of frantic searching but couldn’t find it .. we finally used a 16 penny nail and then replaced that with a 1/4 inch stainless bolt and nut… (two days later I found the pin exactly where I had first looked for it thinking I had put it there. It was one of those cases where I must have looked right at it and not seen it.)
ok we were all pooped and decided to quit for the day.. the mast was up and all stays and shrouds loosely connected and holding it secure.
BTW, Sony Ericsson just announced a WATERPROOF cell phone… Might be of use to us sailors, as Sherry over at Stay of Execution, you and I have all killed phones in the last few months.
Yep I’m thinking about it.. i wish i could get them to let me have two phones on my number.. a nice work phone/palm pilot and then a cheap phone for boating.