Mast climbing : possibility or not?

[Sybarite]

Just ruminating (for a single hander) :

Halliard taken round a block at the base of the mast forward to the windlass pawl and the bitter end brought back to the mast climber who threads through a block (on his belt ?) with a cleat.

He then operates the windlass with a remote.

 

[Sandy]

And when something goes wrong how does the mast climber extricate themselves from that?

Jumars or prusik knot to climb a halyard and a figure of eight to abseil down another.

 

[Robih]

That sounds to me like an appointment at A&E.

 

[mainsail1]

I have found that all cunning plans to climb the mast alone are great until you are 15 feet off the deck. At that stage you realise that you are being stupid and abandon all plans until you have a second crew member to wind the winch and you have a bosun's chair.

 

[scruff]

Give it a go - only see if you can live stream it to youtube for us all to have a giggle at*


* Don't actually do this.

I can see using the windlass as a powered winch to get you up the mast would work, on the proviso it is operated by someone on the deck and also had a secondary backup halyard. Our boat has foldout mast steps, wasn't an important feature in deciding to buy the boat, but will be a feature in future boats we own. Makes climbing the mast a near trivial endeavour

 

[Iliade]

Just fit steps. [edit: crossed posts]

I use two shunts and a GriGri, but it is hard work. One of these appeals.

 

[RobWard]

And when something goes wrong how does the mast climber extricate themselves from that?

Jumars or prusik knot to climb a halyard and a figure of eight to abseil down another.

Speaking as a climber that seems the way to go. If you're single-handed, do you have any sort of safety backup?

 

[jimi]

I use two ascendeurs. One fixed to my chest and attached to a climbing harness so if I move up it automatically moves up with me and another on a foot loop below the the other, stand in footloop, move up , move footloop ascendeur up and repeat. Coming down is more of a faff, I used to put a stitch plate on another rope for safety and descent but I don't bother now. I just descend by lowering footloop stand in it and carefully release chest ascendeur and bend knees and then let chest ascendeur catch and repeat until back at bottom. Once you've done it a couple of time (and survived) it works ok. I would'nt recommend it for thos unfamiliar with rope techniques though! The powered winch sounds great but I can see a few fatal flaws!

 

[BurnitBlue]

I heard that someone in one of the Ionian boatyards tried this using a wireless remote. He went out of range some way up the mast. I think he had to lower the remote to a rescuer on the deck to get back down. Recepter thingy in the windlass was optimum when horizontal.

 

[Sandy]

Speaking as a climber that seems the way to go. If you're single-handed, do you have any sort of safety backup?

I miss-spent my youth climbing and had five years in a MRT.

I've actually being giving this a bit of thought, due to some long distance single handed voyages I've got planned. I can attach my halyards to a bar at the base of the mast and haul them taught. I am working out a way that you are attached to two ropes perhaps using one to go up and one as your safety with perhaps a figure of eight.

 

[Roberto]

Jumars or prusik knot to climb a halyard and a figure of eight to abseil down another.

I use jumars and grigri too, but after having seen this I immediately bought a proper climbing rope

 

[Tomahawk]

I have a Petzl climbing harness, a GriGri and an Ascender with very long foot loops..

I go up using the Grigri and Ascender then take the Ascender completely off and use the Grigri as a clutch for a controlled descent.
I use the main halyard through the clutch then do a bargemans hitch round the winch to make off so there is absolutely no way it can come off.

By way of backup I also have a Petzl Stop on the topping lift as an emergency. You have to tie a weight (half a bucket of water) to the bottom of the emergency line to keep it roughly tight so the Stop rolls up the line easily. ... I tried the Stop by way of jerking it down a line.. it stopped pretty damn fast ... then was very awkward to re-set. If you ever actually needed it.. it wold be a fire brigade job to get down.

Even though the halyards are 10mm Spectra with a breaking strain near on 10 tones... I still hate going up the stick.

 

[ff_nick]

Well, if you've got the bitter end, what can end bitterly? Please post video.

 

[jimi]

I miss-spent my youth climbing and had five years in a MRT.

I've actually being giving this a bit of thought, due to some long distance single handed voyages I've got planned. I can attach my halyards to a bar at the base of the mast and haul them taught. I am working out a way that you are attached to two ropes perhaps using one to go up and one as your safety with perhaps a figure of eight.

I'd use a grigri rather than a fig 8 for the safety/descent on a separate rope. Whatever system you use the descent rope needs some slack .. (unless you use my risky descending with ascendeur technique, the top ascendeur could be replaced with a shunt .. but only use it on one rope)

 

[Bru]

My setup is basically the same as Tomahawk's

I chose the single ascender with a gri-gri setup with a fall arrestor on a backup line after consulting with a tree surgeon acquaintance

Like Toma i rapidly switched to using a proper climbing rope rather than ascend/ descend on a halyard

It's a solid safe setup which feels totally secure and controllable which is the exact opposite of how i feel when somebody else is attempting to winch me up a mast!

 

[LittleSister]

I seem to recall reading advice never to use an electric winch for mast climbing, even if you have an assistant on deck, following an accident causing injury where the deck assistant lost control of the winch. I can't remember the details, but presumably the control stuck on or off, or was accidentally reversed.

Using one for mast climbing single-handed via a remote would seem to be asking for big trouble.

 

[Sandy]

I use jumars and grigri too, but after having seen this I immediately bought a proper climbing rope

No plans to commit suicide up the mast, who ever runs a stanley knife vertically down a rope under tension?

 

[Rappey]

I made a ladder which slides up the sail track to keep it taught and a troll rocker on a second taught line as a safety.. Works so well others want to borrow it..

 

[Roberto]

I think there may be a sun exposure long enough to make the stanley knife unnecessary, I prefer not to try and guess

No plans to commit suicide up the mast, who ever runs a stanley knife vertically down a rope under tension?

 

[NorthUp]

The last time I was hauled up a mast the first shackle I looked at was the one I was hanging off.
I came straight back down and hired a cherrypicker!