Another confessional........

[West Coast]

Spent the day preparing the boat for the winter - how smug was I as the well practiced routine went as slick as could be, cushions, books, sails all smartly removed and neatly packed in the car, engine oil change and water circuits winterised, batteries removed........

Then set about replacing the halyards with winter lines, easy job, carried out every year. But how important, I have always told others, to properly connect the lines so you don't loose the halyard, easy if you know how. So, imagine the horror when replacing the genoa halyard to feel the replacement line go slack, and see the halyard gently falling in rough coils at my feet.

Feel a complete numpty tonight, left with the prospect of reeving the genoa halyard in the spring

 

[Norman_E]

I always sew the halyard to the mouseing line with waxed whipping twine tied with a reef knot and have never had one come undone. What do you do?

 

[West Coast]

I always sew the halyard to the mouseing line with waxed whipping twine tied with a reef knot and have never had one come undone. What do you do?

Use a length of Monel wire, pushed through each end of the rope and returned back on itself at each end by approx 50mm, then taped over the lot. But this time, I only had a shorter length of wire, so the return was only 25mm or so, this pulled through.

 

[Twister_Ken]

Whip a loop onto the halyard end. Tie mouse to this. Takes a few minutes per halyard, but once done it's done for life - well, the life of the halyard, anyway.

 

[KenMcCulloch]

When making up a new braid on braid halyard it's easy to form a small flat loop by making a normal eye splice, but without any core going through the eye part, so you have a flat eye made from cover only, and only a slight thickening where the cover goes into the core. Our professionally made main and headsail halyards had been done like that when we bought the boat and I copied the method when making up a new staysail halyard last year.

 

[davidpbo]

My confessional.

Took the boat out to my mooring to raise the buoy and remove pickup buoy, mooring chain and back up strop. Moored the boat using the mooring chain as usual and lifted the buoy with a rope over the pulpit.

Had a brief moment of concern as I removed the shackle between the riser chain and the mooring chain that the boat and me in the tender were no longer moored to anything before I rememberd the rope lifting the mooring buoy.

 

[Seajet]

We've all made cock-ups; there are two types of people, those who admit it or liars !

 

[West Coast]

When making up a new braid on braid halyard it's easy to form a small flat loop by making a normal eye splice, but without any core going through the eye part, so you have a flat eye made from cover only, and only a slight thickening where the cover goes into the core. Our professionally made main and headsail halyards had been done like that when we bought the boat and I copied the method when making up a new staysail halyard last year.

This is a good idea - my new main halyard has this loop which does make for more foolproof connection to the winter lines, and also I'd small enough to thread through the rope clutches.