Forestay help

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suffolktim

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Hi fellow boaters....

After all of your help and advice on work I needed to do on my Dockrell 17, I was hoping that I could pick your brains again now its on the water.

It has been noted by people who have sailed in her that the mast might be raked to far back and that the shrouds are too loose. I can adjust the shrouds, but I think the main problem is the forestay and its position.

The forestay wire inside the roller reefing tube was replaced this season, and it stretched a bit (I had to go from a one inch shackle to a half inch) and it still seems to slack. The problem is that I dont have any more room for tightening it (apart from maybe 10mm on so if i lashed the forestay directly to the fitting on the deck that its attached to).

The fitting is also a worry, as for a start it doesnt look very strong (just a welded loop) that is located abot ten inches back from the bow, on the foredeck...and when I looked underneath there is absolutely NO backing to it at all, just nuts and small washers!! I can obviously rectify this, but Im not even sure its in the right place.

All of the Dockrell 17's appear (in drawings and a few photos) to have forestay coming directly from the bow and the one I could look closely at appeared to be using the top hole of the bow/anchor roller.

I could simply put a bolt through the top of the roller fitting and lash/shackle forestay to that, but do you think it might put to much leverage on the top foredeck moulding of the boat? This solution would also give the chance to rake mast back a bit as fitting is further away!

I had also considered taking everything off and fitting a stem fitting to the bow, but this would be expensive and take lots of time when I am now on the water! (Could do this next time she is out).

What do you guys think would be the best solution? I would really appreciate any ideas...are there any Dockrell owners that could tell me what they do on theirs?

Cheers in advance!

Tim

 
Could you move the eye-plate forward a bit? You could use two of the existing holes and put in a backing pad at the same time!
 
You could move the bow roller to the side and the forestay attachment up to the bow. Both could be strengthened at the same time with a substantial glassed in backing pad. Depending on what is already there, you could strengthen the bond between the deck and the hull at the same time.
 
Both the above sound good to me; I wouldn't use the upper hole/s in the bow roller as that's where a drop - nose pin should go for keeping the anchor warp or mooring chain restrained in the roller; and it looks to have a fair bit of leverage on it, have you checked the backing on that as well ?

I'm not crazy about the shackle to the deck eye but can't see clearly, can you find a clevis pin stronger, shorter and narrower, with a split pin securing it rather than a split ring...
 
Wouldn't that get in the way of any mooring / anchoring though ?

A shaped stainless plate under the aft of the roller incorporating a new forestay eye - all through bolted with suitably overkill backing underneath - would be spiffing, and suffolktim sounds well able to sort that and suitable backing with wooden pads and at least penny washers underneath.
 
Hey guys, thanks so much for all of your ideas, I really appreciate them all, and it has really helped to get me thinking. I think fashioning a custom plate might well be the way forward, as suggested several times.

As the foredeck is stepped, I propose to take some 60mm wide flat stainless bar and run it from the bow, aft until I reach the first step. Then overlap a second piece of flat bar also from the bow, and continue aft for another 60mm or so once it is past the piece below it. I would re-mount the bow roller, and just aft of this I would bolt on/weld on a piece of 10mm stainless box (with the top cut off of course), for the forestay to bolt/pin onto. The whole lot would be well bolted down through the foredeck, and either through a glassed in piece of ply, or a piece of flat delrin....cue the quick back of an envelope sketch....



What do you guys reckon to that?!
 
I think you're on the right lines, but personally I'd go for flat ( OK may have to be curved a bit ) stainless plate on deck with the fittings bolted through it to backing pads and underside plates / penny washers on wooden pads; neater and not relying on welds to hold.
 
Get a long eye bolt & drill almost vertically down through the bow fairlead right through the bow so the hole exits down the bow about 150mm down. Shape the exit so that you can get a nut and washer in nice & square and flush with the face of the bow. Tighten it up & then fill the face in so the nut & washer is hidden & you just see the ring at the top sitting on top of the fairlead. The hole that you drill will almost certainly go through solid GRP all the way so be perfectly strong. Make sure you get a good quality eye bolt. If someone like Wichard do them then get one of those as they tend to be of better quality . Otherwise try someone like Proboat.
 
I'd just buy a new and shorter forestay (assuming that the present one wasn't exactly new). If there isn't any visible cracking around the eye plate I'd assume that the deck is strong enough by design. If cracked then a metal backing plate bedded on filler - ply will crush more easily than glass.
 
I like Daydream Believer's idea of a long bolt right through the stem; but rather than a flush nut & washer, how about a stainless ' bash plate ' shaped around the stem - it wouldn't need to be huge and would be a lot more effective than a sunken washer.

Don't take it for granted that all inside the stem will be solid and strong; the one weak poorly designed part of my 22' is the stem / lower forestay tang, which all looks very solid grp but in fact has a vertical plywood pad inside; the builders obviously thought it ' encapsulated ' but water can get in and rot it; as the Dockrell is about the same vintage I wouldn't be surprised to find a similar arrangement - all fairly easily repairable but must be checked.

If you could incorporate a plate on deck so the aft end of the bow roller is definitely secure I think that would be very good, with that done you can have full confidence in the rig and when mooring.

Whatever you do, take lots of photo's, at least a couple including a current newspaper front page; these will prove the date of the modification, which will be handy if you come to sell the boat later; and lots of photo's as you're very likely to be asked by other Dockrell owners as son as they see this thread or later on.
 
Not too keen on that existing eye pad as a forestay mount. Looks a bit DIY/guess the load.
Again, the screws/bolts holding the bow roller were probably fitted without thinking about tension loads.
So, my input is to use a U bolt (Common for shroud mounts) with a lot of backing and carrying the load to the hull. Bit of glass work down the stem should do it..
 
Wow...love all the ideas guys! I was having a rumage about in my boat bits boxes earlier for ideas, and found an m6 'proboat' eyebolt, still on its retail card. I phoned up proboat, and they looked up the specs for it. Its rated to 850kg...plenty enough strength. Now as I dont really plan on anchoring with the bow roller, and I use the fairleads on the mooring, so I am not worried about blocking its anchoring capabilities! I am seriously considering replacing the single forward bolt that holds down the bow roller with the eyebolt that Ive found.

On the underside of the deck I would put a substantial backing pad for all of the bolts that come through the fitting, including the new eyebolt. I have also found a bottle screw, and I am tempted to strop that to the underside of the new eyebolt, and to the inside of another eyebolt that comes through the bow, and tension it all up for extra rigidity.

I also like the idea of using the bow roller to assist with raising/lowering the mast, and the arrangement would still leave room for doing that.

Re how much to aft rake it has - I am not exactly sure, (was going to measure it on a calm day), but I reckon it must be a good couple of mast widths. The previous owner has said that the shrouds were tight and the mast looked right before the new forestay wire that he had made up by a rigger early this year. Since the forestay was put back on it seems to have stretched (gone from a one inch shackle to a half inch one) and now theres no room to tighten it anymore, and the shrouds are still a bit loose. Moving the forestay to inside the bow roller on an eyebolt would mean that I would have adjustment room again (was going to lash forestay to eyebolt with dyneema), and I can then bring mast back up a bit.

For anyone still reading this and not asleep at this point, does this sound like a reasonable plan?...
 
Just found a 'side on' pic from the last sail out. Just to say, the forward end of the stackpack being tied around the mast makes the rake look even worse.

Just got the last post on the thread...definately going to glass around the inside of the stem, and I would also check/add glass around the deck to hull seam

 
Maybe use one of the two back holes - that way you could still run an anchor warp over the roller. Anchoring can be fun - and something all boats should be able to do as a safety measure.
 
A couple of diameters of rake would be mid range on a lot of boats, but does look a bit much on yours. Looking at the geometry I can't see that moving the fitting forward is actually going to achieve much, so since it's a newish forestay I'll modify my earlier suggestion to but a new one, and say take it to a rigger to shorten it. It'll only cost a few quid. As I said earlier, if there's no sign of cracking I can't understand why everyone's panicking about the strength of the deck.
 
I had be weighing up using one of the aft holes, but I wasnt sure if it would be ok for the forestay to be offset...wheras the forward hole is central....
 
anoccasionalyachtsman said:
A couple of diameters of rake would be mid range on a lot of boats, but does look a bit much on yours. Looking at the geometry I can't see that moving the fitting forward is actually going to achieve much, so since it's a newish forestay I'll modify my earlier suggestion to but a new one, and say take it to a rigger to shorten it. It'll only cost a few quid. As I said earlier, if there's no sign of cracking I can't understand why everyone's panicking about the strength of the deck.
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