Removing mainsail with Sailman batten cars

[Puggy]

Hello,

I bought a Nauticat 43 ketch last May, and it has a fully battened North mainsail with Bainbridge Sailman roller bearing batten cars (5000 series I think). I want to take the mainsail off for the winter but I cannot work out how to remove the mainsail from the mast. There is no obvious way (gate etc) that the batten cars slide in or out of the mast, and if they did coem out, there seem to be lots of plastic ball bearings just waiting to bounch into the sea....

There does not seem to a release mechanism on the plastic batten socket to allow the stainless pin to be removed. Do I have to remove the nut retaining the articulated stainless bolt into the batten car on the mast (being careful not to drop the assortment of washers etc - not ideal if having to be done underway)

Additionally, every other batten car is a stiched loop of sail tape to the sail (no batten) and the only way of releasing these seems to be to push out some form of (plastic?) pin from the batten car.

I am at a loss how to do this - anyone had any experience of this system? All thoughts gratefully received...

Thanks

 

[earlybird]

By coincidence, there is a query regarding worn slides on a 5000 system in the latest PBO. "Expert" Mike Coates says there should be 2 removable short lengths of track, 100mm long, one at the gooseneck, the second one 1 metre higher. They should be attached by 5 mm machine screws tapped either into the mast or a "slug" in the track. He adds that they might be very difficult to remove.
Hope that helps.
Add:- AFAIK, the Sailman 5000 system was especially for a separate, external mast track, but re-reading your post suggests yours might not be like this, in which case it differs from PBO.
Further difference. PBO says 5000 cars have plastic low-friction inserts, not balls.

 

[Puggy]

Thanks Earlybird - PBO just arrived so I will have a read.

 

[snooks]

I had sailman battens on my old mainsail, and have kept the slides for my new main.

You should have a mast gate. I'll be very surprised if you don't. Mine is an insert the shape of an elongated running track above the gooseneck. you can see it's shape, but you have to look closely to see it's screwed in with two captive posi screws, but you need a screwdriver that will fit through the mast groove in order to get it out. The good news is the screws inside are captive, bad news is they are SS and the mast is aluminium so they usually corrode...never mind

Removing the mast slides is a case of getting a 10mm ring spanner, putting it over the nyloc nut at the bottom and covering it with your thumb and unscrewing the pin out of the top. (easier done with an electric screwdriver) Catch the nyloc nut before it makes a break for it over the side and pull the pin out. If your sail has bobbins, little black plastic things attached by webbing, catch them as well when you pull out the pin. Lots of accessible pockets help with this job

To remove the battens get some duct tape and tape over the top of the nuts in the luff end of the batten pocket before you start. Turn the sail over and unscrew the bolts, this way the nuts should stay in position as you unscrew them. Afterwards remove the tape and the screws should be attached, if not poke them through and keep the whole lot somewhere safe. Take a couple of nuts and bolts up to your local chandler, and get some spares!

 

[Puggy]

Thanks Snooks - I will look for the gate. I agree there must be one. It might be under the batten cars on the mast.