Standing rigging failures.

[B27]

I had a shroud fail on a dinghy at about 13 years.
Talking to a few people it should be expected.
Funny stuff, stainless IMHO.

Failures are pretty rare, but then lots of boats are not used much.

 

[geem]

I had a shroud fail on a dinghy at about 13 years.
Talking to a few people it should be expected.
Funny stuff, stainless IMHO.

Failures are pretty rare, but then lots of boats are not used much.

Where did it fail?

 

[BobnLesley]

For instance one can renew their standing rigging and potentially have inferior materials supplied or used that has a shorter lifspan than what they originally had in place...

Steveeasy

About fifteen years ago - so probably no longer applicable/correct - but in a conversation with a yacht surveyor, who worked for the insurance companies rather than boat buyers, he said much the same thing: "We insist the rigging's renewed at ten years old, but other than a couple of companies - I think one was in Denmark and the other Germany - 90% of the wire that's being used to re-rig those yachts is of a poorer quality than the ten year old stuff that they're removing."

Moral of the story? Do not ignore your lowers - the hardest working part of your rig.

I've heard similar from riggers in several places, most particularly the rear-lowers. Having heard it the first time, it's a question I've posed subsequently and all have agreed; other than an inexplicable lower fitting failure on a forestay, the broken strands we've found over the years have all been on rear-lowers. Though for balance, I was never overly enamoured with the 'recently installed' rigging that was on ours when we bought it; given the price the PO paid (we saw the invoice) it should've lasted a lifetime, but we'd renewed the lot inside six years.

 

[Sea Change]

The only rig failures I've been personally involved with all concerned incorrect or missing fittings, rather than fatigue or breakage. Check those split pins!

Re: backing up the rig, I do make a conscious effort to store stow spare halyards in such a way that they would help support the rig if a stay failed. Although the grab rails and toerail that I secure them to might well just fail under the load. Maybe I should install some chunky u-bolts in the deck specifically for the purpose?

 

[srm]

No opinion about galvanised steel wire yet.

Probably because ss has cornered the market, looks better and does not need treating with preservative coatings.

However, having owned at least one cruising yacht, sometimes two, for just shy of 50 years I have experience of sailing with galvanised wire standing rigging.

Back in the day the received wisdom was that galvanised wire gave warning before failure with "fishhooks" formed by broken strands. However, I don't think galvanised wire was available in the 1 x 19 semi-rigid construction as now used in ss rigging, so would have been a more flexible form with multiple thinner strands for any given diameter. In the smaller diameters the galvanising would also start to wear and give rise to rust streaks as an advanced warning of failure risk. Traditional vessels would, and probably still do, dress the rigging with various concoctions to preserve the wire. In the latter case the wire could have a long working life. I know of one owner of a 40+ ft. trad boat in the late 70's who had some of his rigging load tested, only to be told to keep it as it exceeded what was expected from the wire they had in stock.

Perhaps a more flexible ss construction would give a better life than 1x19, but would probably be subject to initial stretch when setting up the rig and need to be a larger diameter for any given SWL. One boat I owned in the 80's and sailed hard as a charter/sailing school yacht for nine years had twin forestays about 10 centimetres apart to speed up hanked on headsail changes. (The disadvantage being a slight loss of tension in the stay compared to a single forestay). These were made from flexible ss wire with hand spliced eyes rather than swages and took a serious battering at times from side loads. I was happy to keep them when changing the rest of the rig from galvanised, with rust streaks after a couple of seasons, to a larger diameter 1x19 ss.

 

[geem]

Probably because ss has cornered the market, looks better and does not need treating with preservative coatings.

However, having owned at least one cruising yacht, sometimes two, for just shy of 50 years I have experience of sailing with galvanised wire standing rigging.

Back in the day the received wisdom was that galvanised wire gave warning before failure with "fishhooks" formed by broken strands. However, I don't think galvanised wire was available in the 1 x 19 semi-rigid construction as now used in ss rigging, so would have been a more flexible form with multiple thinner strands for any given diameter. In the smaller diameters the galvanising would also start to wear and give rise to rust streaks as an advanced warning of failure risk. Traditional vessels would, and probably still do, dress the rigging with various concoctions to preserve the wire. In the latter case the wire could have a long working life. I know of one owner of a 40+ ft. trad boat in the late 70's who had some of his rigging load tested, only to be told to keep it as it exceeded what was expected from the wire they had in stock.

Perhaps a more flexible ss construction would give a better life than 1x19, but would probably be subject to initial stretch when setting up the rig and need to be a larger diameter for any given SWL. One boat I owned in the 80's and sailed hard as a charter/sailing school yacht for nine years had twin forestays about 10 centimetres apart to speed up hanked on headsail changes. (The disadvantage being a slight loss of tension in the stay compared to a single forestay). These were made from flexible ss wire with hand spliced eyes rather than swages and took a serious battering at times from side loads. I was happy to keep them when changing the rest of the rig from galvanised, with rust streaks after a couple of seasons, to a larger diameter 1x19 ss.

Hydrualic swages are the weakness in modern s/s rigging. It's one of the reasons why we have used mechanical Stalkoks on the main mast this time around. Broken strands on Staloks are a rare thing.
Mast pumping to weather is another cause of rigging failure. Especially when a wire is contained in an aluminium foil extrusion. If an inner forestay is subject to slackening and stretching continuously, going up wind, the flex in the wire needs to go somewhere. It can't do this in the extrusion so it has to happen where the wire is outside the extrusion. This happened to us on our previous boat in 2005 crossing the pond. We had virtually the whole trip to weather. The inner forestay failed due to mast pumping. The wire broke just below the top terminal fitting due to constant bending of the wire over a very short length. The whole furler and sail went over the side.

 

[Keith 66]

^^^^ Interesting, over the years i have seen quite a few forestay failures at our club, they always seem to happen at the top of the furler & less often at the bottom, this explains why.
But a lot will be down to poor quality stainless steel made in the far east or wherever, cheap commercial grades being sold as marine etc.
When we bought or Sabre the mast had not been down in 30 years, everything was slack & worn. We sailed her home gingerly under reefed main & small jib. Following week took her out of the water & had the mast craned out.
I bent one of the lowers at the crosstrees & two thirds of the strands were already snapped at the talurit. Most of the others were not far behind. The whole lot was scrap!

 

[srm]

Interesting, over the years i have seen quite a few forestay failures at our club, they always seem to happen at the top of the furler & less often at the bottom, this explains why.

Also, the top of the stay tends to be the area damaged by halyard wraps. After an inadvertent halyard wrap is released the stay can look OK from deck level but the lay may have been partly untwisted.

 

[Roberto]

Hydrualic swages are the weakness in modern s/s rigging. It's one of the reasons why we have used mechanical Stalkoks on the main mast this time around. Broken strands on Staloks are a rare thing.
Mast pumping to weather is another cause of rigging failure. Especially when a wire is contained in an aluminium foil extrusion. If an inner forestay is subject to slackening and stretching continuously, going up wind, the flex in the wire needs to go somewhere. It can't do this in the extrusion so it has to happen where the wire is outside the extrusion. This happened to us on our previous boat in 2005 crossing the pond. We had virtually the whole trip to weather. The inner forestay failed due to mast pumping. The wire broke just below the top terminal fitting due to constant bending of the wire over a very short length. The whole furler and sail went over the side.

I had the same failure but the culprit was the plastic disk fitted right at the end of the swage to avoid halyard wrap (the only place I could not inspect, impossible to unscrew it as old and brittle), one commercial name is "Multitop", the wire outer strands under its position were definitely corroded. I see it is in use in many boats but at least for me never again. Fortunately we had the rolled genoa up which kept the mast up and gave us time to fit the removable forestay. The following day we decided to lower the entire rolled sausage (sail+tubes+wire) on the deck, electric pilot in high precision mode right down the waves direction, we became sort of Lancelot of the high seas Had to divert to a different destination and a planned 2day passage became a 6 day one.

 

[steveeasy]

I had the same failure but the culprit was the plastic disk fitted right at the end of the swage to avoid halyard wrap (the only place I could not inspect, impossible to unscrew it as old and brittle), one commercial name is "Multitop", the wire outer strands under its position were definitely corroded. I see it is in use in many boats but at least for me never again. Fortunately we had the rolled genoa up which kept the mast up and gave us time to fit the removable forestay. The following day we decided to lower the entire rolled sausage (sail+tubes+wire) on the deck, electric pilot in high precision mode right down the waves direction, we became sort of Lancelot of the high seas Had to divert to a different destination and a planned 2day passage became a 6 day one.

Quite difficult to inspect the forestay even with it off until you remove the thing which is probably when your replacing the full standing rigging. 10 years of sailing and ive never had total confidence in my rigging despite replacing all the standing rigging. Think Im going to do a full inspection of everything now. from top to bottom.

When I bought my boat the first item I found on the deck was a loose split pin. My mast is off as im fitting a new deck ring so im going to inspect every item from top to bottom including that forestay. was very hard to pull in which is not a good sign.

Steveeasy

 

[doug748]

I normally pitch in with the same stories here but I do agree with the points about forestay wire being vulnerable at the top of the mast, stranding there has happened to me.
It's plausible that shock waves from flogging sails travel up the extrusion and this (one rigger pointed out to me) is made worse with the habit some people have of slackening the rigging fully, thinking that helps. This is sometimes taken to extremes and it is a sight to see at 35kts in winter.

Someone mentioned attaching halyards as a backup. I was on a Sadler that lost it's backstay and the mast was saved by the owners habit of attaching the topping lift to the pushpit. First there is a crack as the fitting fails, then a whoosh as the backstay and all it's attachments transits the cockpit at high speed (with luck missing everyone), then there is a thawck as tension comes fully on the mainsheet, then a rip as the mainsail splits from leach to luff. Then, luckily for us, a twang as tension came on the 6mm topping lift, it held.

I am also a bit suspicious of some roll swages and would probably swap to Sta Loc next time. I doubt wire breaks much, if at all, inspection of fittings is the key.

.

 

[srm]

Thanks guys, I have just sold my last cruising boat and was feeling a bit sad and empty. However, all these tales of woe make me realise how lucky I have been over the last fifty years (minus a few months) of yacht ownership. Not one rigging failure and having lived and sailed far from yacht yards never had a professional rigger touch any of my boats' gear.

 

[Supertramp]

Blimey. Just as I thought it was safe to go out....

Learnings from this post:

Solent stay rigged all tIme, halyards led fore and aft where possible, Stalok terminals next time, regular inspection in detail of wire ends into fittings at least at deck level.

Good thread.

 

[srm]

I was on a Sadler that lost it's backstay and the mast was saved by the owners habit of attaching the topping lift to the pushpit.

Most of my boats had two backstays. I would also fit larger diameter forestays even though, on my last boat, it also meant replacing both roller reefing gears (cutter rig) to take the larger diameter wire. As I have always done my own rigging I used to use Norseman, then Staylock terminals.

 

[Mike Bryon]

Like others my experience is that the lowers are the first to show signs of fatigue.

I have previously made sure halyards occupied any spare mast head rollers and the topping lift is upgraded to a halyard (dimensions) and these are all led to deck fitting when offshore. I consider a keel stepped mast and an inner forestay a high priority in the belief it is a more secure set up.

 

[Zing]

As to where the weakness is, I asked my old sea dog of a rigger as to where serious failures were most often seen that brought down the rig and he said it was the D1 and D2s, not so much the lowers. In fact on my last NDT rig check it was the D2 rod ends that were bad (cracks in the stem-ball fitting).

 

[Frank Holden]

As to where the weakness is, I asked my old sea dog of a rigger as to where serious failures were most often seen that brought down the rig and he said it was the D1 and D2s, not so much the lowers. In fact on my last NDT rig check it was the D2 rod ends that were bad (cracks in the stem-ball fitting).

Thats what failed on my first incident, crack was inside the mast , out of sight.

 

[BurnitBlue]

I have been reading sta-lok pdf's and surfing the web about inspecting and replacing rigging. Professional riggers mostly recommend swaged terminals at the top of the mast because they are upside down and resist material ingress contamination and water drips. Sta-lok to chainplates on deck with suitable toggles for articulation.

By far the best on YouTube is a pair of back to back videos by Sailing Fair Isle, Rigging 101 part 1 and part 2. He includes conversations with professional practicing riggers. All good stuff. IMO of course.

 

[Frank Holden]

I have been reading sta-lok pdf's and surfing the web about inspecting and replacing rigging. Professional riggers mostly recommend swaged terminals at the top of the mast because they are upside down and resist material ingress contamination and water drips. Sta-lok to chainplates on deck with suitable toggles for articulation.

By far the best on YouTube is a pair of back to back videos by Sailing Fair Isle, Rigging 101 part 1 and part 2. He includes conversations with professional practicing riggers. All good stuff. IMO of course.

Apart from one all my issues have involved swages at the upper end. My perfect world is tangs on the mast and staloks throughout.
First pic is upper end of my lowers when I arrived back in Chile from NZ in 2016, note slight misalignment on stbd one... this was the one with broken strands.
Second pic, the kit I had brought out from UK , don't have the paperwork but think was something like the Rig Shop , Fareham, or some such.
Note the long legged Sta'Loks that let me use the existing wire, we made the alloy 'slug' - not shown - locally

 

[geem]

Like others my experience is that the lowers are the first to show signs of fatigue.

I have previously made sure halyards occupied any spare mast head rollers and the topping lift is upgraded to a halyard (dimensions) and these are all led to deck fitting when offshore. I consider a keel stepped mast and an inner forestay a high priority in the belief it is a more secure set up.

I am not convinced a keel stepped mast would be any better off with a wire failure.

I have been reading sta-lok pdf's and surfing the web about inspecting and replacing rigging. Professional riggers mostly recommend swaged terminals at the top of the mast because they are upside down and resist material ingress contamination and water drips. Sta-lok to chainplates on deck with suitable toggles for articulation.

By far the best on YouTube is a pair of back to back videos by Sailing Fair Isle, Rigging 101 part 1 and part 2. He includes conversations with professional practicing riggers. All good stuff. IMO of course.

On my mizzen mast the hydraulic swaged eye terminals at the top cracked. The bottom ones were fine.
Mid Atlantic Yacht Services in Horta, Azores repair lots of rigs after people make the West to East Atlantic crossing. He told me the biggest rig failure they see is swaged fittings on lowers. I am sure this is associated with mast pumping. In any other situation, most people faced with a few days bashing to weather would simply not leave. If you are 1000nm from land, you have little choice but to carry on. Bashing to weather in 2 to 3m seas is hard on the rig