Going up the stick...

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Reptile Smile

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How big does a boat have to be before one is happy to be winched up the stick? I know that on my previous 'dinghy with a lid', on which I could raise and lower the mast single-handed by not-so-brute force, there was no way I was going up it, and frankly no reason I would ever need to.

My 24' Eventide seems rather more substantial. If I needed to, would it be feasible? Should I be concerned about the robustness of the mounting of the mast? I've never been up a mast, and the concern is of 'tipping it over', though I appreciate this is probably not easy to do.

Sorry. Feels a bit daft to ask...
 
Fix the bosun's chair to the main halyard. Winch it up just enought to take your weight whilst standing by the mast. Walk out to the widest part of the boat. Take hold of the mast stays and lift your feet off the deck. If the boat does not tip over then neither will it tip over when you are at the masthead. This advice assumes reasnably calm water!
 
Going up the stick

My guess is that a heavy 24fter should be quite stable enough. Yes I know what you mean about a smaller boat and stability. My light 21fter was tested recently to pull down for checking stability. While it took 2 of us to pull it down by halyard once near horizontal it took only 40kgs to hold the 8metre mast down and that was at the hounds about 1.5 metres from the top. So no I would never try to go up my mast. good luck and be careful olewill
 
As Richard describes above, you can establish definitively if the stability is satisfactory by sitting in the bosuns chair with your feet off the deck - as soon as you lift your feet, the boat immediately thinks that your weight has been transferred to the sheave at the top of the mast.
And if nothing breaks then, you should be ok for going up the mast. It would be a good idea to have a back up halyard attached to your bosun's chair as well, perhaps with another person tailing on it.
 
Went up the mast of my 25 ft 9inch Stella loads of times
Never had any problem except for the time when the Burnham /Wallasea ferry chap would see me & deliberately alter course to run very close.
He seemed to think it was great fun watching me swing through about a 60 degree arc in his wash
I weighed 16 stone.
You should be OK on an Eventide . Just ask the crew to stay in the centre of the boat & tell the wife to not wander off for a coffee
Another tip is not to swear at her when you are up there. She has the upper hand in these situations
 
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Assuming a bare minimum of fitness surely it would be easier to climb the mast by hand while the person at the winch takes up the slack rather than letting them sweat and struggle over the winch with no help from someone sitting in a bosuns chair just taking in the view. That is my preferred way of doing it but thats probably just me wanting to feel more at ease by hanging on tight to the mast/halyards as I go up and down again.

Smallest yachts mast I've climbed was a Cornish Crabber 22 which was not that high so very easy to scale by hand.

Once lost a halyard end to the masthead on a catamaran when I just had the kids onboard and probably should not have done it but climbed it freehand without a chair or harness or any safety line, got to the top and grabbed the halyard end only to realise the other end had been secured on a cleat. Much yelling to number one son (aged 9 at the time) and he undid it so I could get the halyard without having to make a second trip up there.
 
When I was about 12, I was en root to Plymouth from Fowey on my father's Hurly 24 (fin keel) in a big storm and the Genoa Hilliard broke and got stuck at the top of the mast. We pulled into Polpero and borrowed a bosun's chair from a sheltering yacht. I have a major problem with heights so I couldn't go up the mast. My father had a problem with heights too, but with the help of a local fisherman, we sent him up to the masthead to fix it. We were alongside a quay, but there were no stability problems at all! We got it fixed and were on our way again in no time.

On my hefty, beamy, 20 footer I have sent my 15 year old son half way up and the boat remained very stable. Due to my problem with heights, I will be dropping the mast to do some work on it soon!
 
We had a guy up the mast of a T24 for half an hour and the only way we could get him to come down was to refuse to send his camera up to him! It was remarkably stable and once he'd put a rope around his waist and the mast he was very happy.

I've been halfway up the mast on my 27 footer, which is robably a little less stable, but my nerve broke - I've been known to chicken out four steps up a ladder, so can't be too bad. I use a mast-up ladder in the track with a mate on a safety line. Make sure your mate isn't beneath you. If you drop something you'll have to wait for him to come round before he can release the safety line to let you down.

Rob.
 
I have often wondered what to do if the halliard jammed when I was up there
If on a mooring or at sea the answer would be to use the topping lift & transfer the chair to that then take up the tension on the topping lift to ease the load on the halliard & try & free the halliard. For that reason I have a topping lift capable of taking my weight. If I could not free the halliard then I would release it & come down via the topping lift
If I was in the marina i would get my crew to motor round to the travel lift & get someone to call the fire service & ask for a turntable ladder or cherry picker

Any other ideas ?
 
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