Spinaker Halyard Snapped and is Caught in Side the Mast HELP

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SailJonah

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My Spinnaker Halyard snapped towards the Top of the mast, Probablly inside the mast, I think by chaffing agaist a Rivet or screw head passing into the mast. The External piece of the halyard dropped to the deck. The Halyard has dropped down inside the mast and is well and trully gripped to something inside. I tried putting it around a winch and winding hard but absolutelly no movement.

All Other Halyards, uphauls etc move fine. The Electrics are encased in Conduits and sealed.

Any ideas on how to free this halyard would be greatlly appreciated.

Thanks
 
Try and find a house inspector or a big plumbing company and they may have a fiber-optic inspection camera to look into such a space. I doubt you'll be able to deal with this unless you can see what is happening in there. Another option may be to simply abandon the broken halyard and fish in a replacement. I suspect that the release of tension on the halyard made it ball up somehow inside there. Best of luck and let us know what happens. Jim
 
I don't think you have any choice but to dismast and fish it out.
If you leave the halyard in the mast you may just foul another halyard at the wrong time........ also if you suspect that it was a rivit or screw then you should remove same, as again it may chaff against your main or genoa halyards, giving you the possibility of a major failure.

Sorry to be a pessimist but better to deal with the problem now rather than at sea.

good luck.

Whats the yacht by the way?

poter
 
Replace all the other ropes with insulated wire or something similar, tighten them. Drop a barbed weighted spike of some sort, a straightened fishing hook for instance down the mast. You don't want the barb too big as you'll want it to release if it catches something immovable. If you catch it right you will be able to pull it up.
 
If it's chafing on something sharp inside the mast, I wonder if it has now got well and truly caught on the same thing? Given that you'll want to remove the source of chafe anyway, why don't you try removing the suspect screws / rivets one at a time and see if that frees the halyard?
 
You don't say so but I imagine you have an aluminium mast with holes for the halyards to go in?

Are all the other halyards free?

Dismasting <u>appears</u> the sensible solution but whether the mast is vertical or horizontal it makes no difference.

If the halyard is caught it is caught.

As the halyard refuses to come down you might try to make it go up.

You'll need to climb the mast and you'll need a slender steel tape, the kind electricians use to feed wires in a conduit.

You'll also need some strong twine or a short length of tubing that can run freely along the halyard.
The plan is to feed the steel tape up the mast from where the broken halyard goes in to the mast till it emerges at the top, hopefully, appearing where it can be pulled out and hopefully without weaving round the other halyards.

That's the time to attach a loop of your twine or short length of hose loosely enough round the halyard and firmly to the bottom end of the steel tape.
The plan is to pull on the steel tape hoping to straighten the halyard upwards, giving it slack from the bottom as needed.

Running your other halyards upwards at the same time may help. Remember to attach twine to their bottom ends so you can feed them back in.

With a bit of luck you may see the broken end coming up to the top of the mast.

Good luck
 
Can you remove the sheave where the halyard exits the base of the mast. If you can perhaps you could feed the end of the halyard through some plastic plumbing pipe and push this up into the mast using the halyard as a guide, this will have the effect of pushing the halyard upwards and hopefully freeing it from the direction that it became stuck in the first place.
 
I hate this - it happened to me and we had to dis-mast. Absolute pain. Why don't masts have zips in the side?? /forums/images/graemlins/mad.gif
 
Mast is Aluminium. The Boat is a beneteau First 35 and very comfortable for my large familly of 7. Thanks for your comments and suggestions.
 
Thank you for your Vertical thinking on this. Very Much appreciated. The Logic of Going out the Top, not the bottom is very sound. And in many case will be easier on the ground and not in mid air. But can I hold out until the winter Refit? I will have to do some Preliminary trails along the lines of your thinking.
 
Some clever suggestions already.

Another idea: it might be snagged on a stay attachment inside the mast, either T-ball or a through bolt. When the yacht is derigged, try releasing these one at a time.

It might also be possible to reach inside and pull the halliard (or at least most of it) back out through one of the holes used by the stay attachments. This worked for me once when I lost a power line in the mast.
 
In the end I managed to get the sheaves blocks out at the food of the mast. they where held in by a Push fit fit so the pin and the blocks then came out easilly.

I could see the halyard at the base and then was able to twist push pull the halyard to free a kink that was stopping it moving.
It came out easilly then.

Then send a 14 year old to the top of the mast with a weigthted 4mm cord (Used a fishing weight) to feed a mouse line down the mast to be plucked out of the blocks at the base.

Then it was a matter of sewing the new halyard onto the Mouse cable and it all worked OK.
Help this helps
 
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