Rigging life

Our rigging is 27 years old now. The mast is stored under cover for half the year and I look at every inch of the rigging before going up again. I know that’s not a thorough inspection, but I never lose sleep over it. However I wouldn’t expect a buyer to think anything other than they would want it replaced.
 
BlowingOldBoots said:
The purchaser can demand whatever they want. I would be inclined to state exactly what you have stated here and respectfully reject his demand on this matter. If the boat has been offered at a favourable price compared to the market, point that out. At the end of the day, rigging replacement is costly. Would an independent riggers survey be worth the cost to alleviate fears? Difficult one that. Was the rigging age stated in the selling literature, if so, you could point out that his due diligence and price reflected what was based on the advert. I bet this is his surveyor advising that.

I keep my boat in commission all year, rigging is now over 10 years old and I have had it inspected at the 10 year interval for an insurance survey, and again at tbe 12 year interval. They accepted the inspection certificate. So far, so good, so concur with your own opinion, that your rigging is likely sound as a pound.
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The problem is that the pre-purchase survey will almost certainly condemn rigging over 10 years old. And that's the survey a new owner will have to show to insurers.
 
AntarcticPilot said:
The problem is that the pre-purchase survey will almost certainly condemn rigging over 10 years old. And that's the survey a new owner will have to show to insurers.
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My personal experience of this issue was that the insurance company wanted everything on the survey list to be addressed - except the age of the rigging comment (not a pre-purchase survey but an insurance survey).
 
Pye_End said:
My personal experience of this issue was that the insurance company wanted everything on the survey list to be addressed - except the age of the rigging comment (not a pre-purchase survey but an insurance survey).
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When I bought Capricious, even before I appointed a surveyor, I was advised that as the rigging was more than 10 years old it would be condemned. I adjusted my initial offer to take this into account, and was not surprised to see replacing the rigging as a recommendation in the survey.

Others on these fora more expert in metallurgy than I have pointed out that lack of use or light use is not a factor - that the regular cyclical stresses that occur either from the motion of the boat or from wind vibration will accumulate fatigue damage, and that no non-destructive examination can assess the condition of the interior of a rigging wire. I'm quite happy to extend the life of my rigging beyond 10 years, as I'm sure there's a large safety factor in that, but I just replaced my 14 year old rigging, and was happy to have done so.
 
AntarcticPilot said:
The problem is that the pre-purchase survey will almost certainly condemn rigging over 10 years old. And that's the survey a new owner will have to show to insurers.
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Most surveys I have read will either just state the age, or unknown age, or just comment that they were only able to carry out a visual check from the deck. Obviously if this identifies something clearly wrong such a damaged rigging screw it will be noted with a recommendation. Would be unusual to say the rigging must be replaced, more likely if making any recommendation it would be to have an inspection by a rigger. It vis the insurer who makes replacement a condition and as seen from earlier posts not all do even when there is clear evidence that it is well over 10 years old.

So a bit of a lottery and would not be surprised if you got different conditions from different insurers based on the same survey.
 
My insurance specifically asked for rigging age, on last boat it was original (2001) and the quote just lept up about £80 when I put in the rig age... seemed like the easiest option to me at the time.... insurance the additional risk.
 
lustyd said:
You say this as if moving metal parts about somehow causes less wear. Rigging left in place and properly tensioned only needs to deal with corrosion, rigging that's jigged about with twice a year has to contend with rust and work hardening as well as the risk that on any one of those 10 seasons it was not properly tensioned when put on the boat.
Call it 10 year old standing rigging and leave it to the buyer to determine whether it needs replacing. If they want to factor that into the cost then it's a negotiation. It's a sellers market at the moment so you might get lucky. Rigging is a consumable item though and yours is at the industry agreed replacement age, which absolutely should be factored into the selling price. Whether or not you agree with that is irrelevant, it's not going to be your boat going forwards, but you might get lucky and find someone who also disagrees with the 10 year replacement - this forum is full of them!
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So what you are saying is that the rigging on our 3/4 rigged Sigma which was raced two evenings and every weekend in summer and Sundays through the winter, had the backstay being constantly adjusted during every race, the rig tension and mast rake changed for each race to suit the weather, rig tension which could only be achieved by a big spanner, a puddle at the mast foot and which was replaced every ten years had an easier life than a masthead rigged crusing Moody with no less than four lowers where only the backstay is adjusted once or twice a day, did not fly a kite or broach and rarely went upwind?
And how does storing the rig in a loft for six months every year contribute to rust or work hardening?

I have had insurance on different boats now for almost 50 years, I have yet to be asked for a survey, a rig report or the age of my rigging. I did have a claim for a replacement mast once on one of our Sigmas but it was dropped when being stepped.
 
AntarcticPilot said:
When I bought Capricious, even before I appointed a surveyor, I was advised that as the rigging was more than 10 years old it would be condemned. I adjusted my initial offer to take this into account, and was not surprised to see replacing the rigging as a recommendation in the survey.
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As a matter of interest, advised and condemned by whom? If it is the surveyor - this may turn out to be advice rather than compulsion, from my experience.

I only ask as so many people quote insurance companies requiring a rig change based on age, but it really the case?

If we are required to make age based decisions on failures, one would hope that somebody has done the necessary research on this rather than anecdotal, but there is little evidence of hard numbers of this from what I can find.
 
Pye_End said:
As a matter of interest, advised and condemned by whom? If it is the surveyor - this may turn out to be advice rather than compulsion, from my experience.

I only ask as so many people quote insurance companies requiring a rig change based on age, but it really the case?

If we are required to make age based decisions on failures, one would hope that somebody has done the necessary research on this rather than anecdotal, but there is little evidence of hard numbers of this from what I can find.
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By the broker (a reputable one) and confirmed by my brother.
 
I usually drop the mast upon lift-out each year and store the standing rigging in a similar way to the OP (Quandary), on my previous boat the rigging was 20 years old and was still getting a clean bill of health, on my present boat the mast and rigging which is now just about 6 years old, was down and stored from Oct 2019 through to April this year (Covid/lockdown),
All the running rigging is removed, washed and stored hanging up ready for the next season.
 
I suspect that a lot of surveyors (who are all human?) suffer from once bitten twice shy or just play safe or just sometimes listen to scare stories or even read forums
I do know of one case of an anchor winch being condemned because the surveyor was seemingly not aware it would only work when the engine was running (the jury’s still out on that set up )
 
Graham376 said:
Why would you want to adjust the backstay every day when cruising with a masthead rig?
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Because I can, do you never ease the rig tension when going downwind or when you are not sailing.
Even a masthead rig is tunable to a degree and with a 24-1 purchase on the backstay which is just beside my hand I am loathe not to touch it, old habits die hard and when we raced one of our crew was a professional rigger so still I remember a bit about it.

Further to the suggestion that removing and storing the rigging was bad for it I would suggest that a rig which suffers this is far more likely to be understood and to undergo a thorough inspection twice a year?
 
Surely the point is that no non-destructive inspection that is widely available can determine the condition of rigging because faults can occur within swages or other connectors or within the body of the wire? And also, the primary cause of failure is fatigue, which may not be visible on external inspection? What guarantee does inspection by a rigger give? Yes, an inspection can check that no surface strands are damaged, but it cannot see whether there is any damage to strands within splices or in the interior of the wire. It makes sense to me that in the absence of any measure of how fatigued rigging is (analogous to an aircraft's pressurization cycles), we should go on a time basis. 10 years is probably an extremely conservative figure and no doubt rigging which is less exposed to fatigue cycles will last longer - but how to measure fatigue cycles, which includes stresses from wind and wave that occur even when the boat is not in use? Frankly, things like the use of backstay tension probably have less effect than routine vibration caused by the wind in the rigging. Backstay tension probably only changes a few hundred times a year on a hard-driven yacht; vibration and wave action will cause smaller changes in stress, but many times more often.
 
Rigging which is up is subject to the natural vibration of the wind, so stored in a loft for half it's life would extend it considerably. Friends in Ottawa kept their 30ft out of the water and de-rigged in the winter, along with every other boat in the club. This subject came and he said nobody was concerned about replacing at under 20yrs.
 
DownWest said:
Rigging which is up is subject to the natural vibration of the wind, so stored in a loft for half it's life would extend it considerably. Friends in Ottawa kept their 30ft out of the water and de-rigged in the winter, along with every other boat in the club. This subject came and he said nobody was concerned about replacing at under 20yrs.
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In the UK, unrigging is usually much less frequent. I've just had my rigging replaces and also work done to install equipment on the mast. Both the rigger and the electronics person worked on the assumption that the mast might not be down again for many years - their decision, not mine! Capricious' mast has only been down about twice in my ownership of her.
 
I used to winter our Sigma38 ashore with the mast up occasionally, when we were comissioning our Finngulf which replaced it, I slept (or lay) aboard one night on the cradle at Largs with the mast rigged, there was a summer gale and the vibration was horrendous, seemed as if the hull was going to shake off the keel, I resolved never to subject a boat to that again.
 
Just a thought, but as insurance companies are in the risk business, they probably have done their research and concluded that after 10 years there is a significantly higher likelihood of a rig failure (not necessarily a high chance per say, just an increase on the likelihood for the first 10 years). They don't have to analyse each rig, or each case as they will share big data on failures and there is enough information available on the causes to make their decision. 10 years is more than likely an number below which the risk is low enough.

This is borne out by the numerous anecdotes from various contributors to this thread, and is supplemented by the fact that no surveyor or rigger is going to give any guarantees.

There is also probably a healthy "margin" in there for the occasional idiot, liar (never raced nor rallied, sir) and misadventure (I don't know what happened, it was like that when I found it) ? which I take as a good thing for rigs that are well looked after.

But, like most things, it'll need changing eventually......
 
Doubt there is any serious research or information sharing. Rigging failure on cruising boats is rare and more commonly of fittings rather than wire. However I expect a common factor in claims is that the rig was over 10 years old. Not surprising because most boats are over 10 years old. This is an association, not necessarily a causal factor, but at some point a decision was taken based on the notion that is you stopped insuring over 10 year old rigs claims would reduce. Once that decision is taken it becomes "fact" and others follow. Doubt there has ever been any assessment that has actually happened. There are many prohibitions in our lives that come about for exactly this kind of thinking with absolutely no before and after evidence to support them.

Many years ago I supervised some research into investment decision making to find out how well actual outcomes marched the predictions on which the decisions were made. Unable to find any meaningful connection for 2 reasons. First lack of data and second the persons who made the decision were long gone and nobody current was interested.
 
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