That old standing rigging chestnut again

[mocruising]

Was alongside a 12 m fibre glass boat in Yat Marine Turkey recently and the owner was having all his ss standing rigging replaced. We got in to a conversation and I asked him how old the rigging was. He had owned the boat since 1990 and she was 30 years old and it was the first replacement. That must be a record I thought. I have been considering replacing mine as its now 17 years old, but HR do tend to over engineer things, well they used to anyway.

 

[geem]

We had our mainmast re rigged this winter. We believe the cap shrouds and forestay were original. We have all the survey and receipt from previous 3 owners any this suggests the rest of the rig was replaced. The mast had definitely never been down. The boat was built in 1980. Ironically the receipts show the inner forestay was replaced 3 years ago and we were not going to replace that except we found broken strands at the top. The 33 year old 12mm parts were perfect. We replaced it all anyway since we are crossing Atlantic next year. I don't think age is an issue if the rig is in good condition. We had no issue getting insurance as we had a rig survey done that declared everything was in good condition. I assume the broken strands happened on the 440 mile delivery trip to her new home last October when we were in quite boisterous conditions. Either that or the rigger missed it!

 

[Tranona]

Life is little to do with "over engineering". Rarely does it break because it is not strong enough, but usually because of stress or corrosion, and in unpredictable ways. Close inspection, particularly around fittings give a good indication of potential failures. Plenty of examples of rigging lasting 30+ years - and plenty of examples of failures in relatively new rigging.

Would suggest you have your rig down and inspected by a good rigger at least, and if planning more demanding sailing replace it. Not expensive in the big scheme of things.

 

[Koeketiene]

Was alongside a 12 m fibre glass boat in Yat Marine Turkey recently and the owner was having all his ss standing rigging replaced. We got in to a conversation and I asked him how old the rigging was. He had owned the boat since 1990 and she was 30 years old and it was the first replacement. That must be a record I thought.

We replaced our standing rigging in 2009.
Boat launched in 1984 and this was the first time she had her standing rigging replaced.
IMO, if a boat is not raced (and subjected to this additional stress on the rigging that goes with racing) standinging rigging should easily last 20 years.

 

[Koeketiene]

Would suggest you have your rig down and inspected by a good rigger at least, and if planning more demanding sailing replace it.

Hmmm...
A couple of years ago I was offered a free rigging check by a professional rigger.
In his opinion, the rigging was 'not safe' and needed to be replaced immediately (fair enough, I was already planning to have it replaced the next year, but not by his outfit).
Furthermore, not only was the rigging not safe, but neither was the mast - again to be replaced asap.

A few weeks later, I had the boat surveyed - full out of water survey.
I ha asked the surveyor to pay particular attention to the mast (mast had not been stepped, so he had a good look from top to bottom).
Surveyor's verdict: the mast is fine.
I then showed him the rigger's report - his comments: If you needed the work, I can see why you would write such a report.

Choose your rigger carefully, there are some unscrupulous types around.

 

[Tranona]

Hmmm...


Choose your rigger carefully, there are some unscrupulous types around.

I thought about adding that rider when I first posted, particularly bearing in mind the location of the OP. Suppose I am fortunate in using a rigger that does not think like that and was quite happy with the inspection he gave my mast and rigging at 10 years. Went over it very carefully when I was there to see what he was doing.

 

[TimBennet]

Hmmm... Choose your rigger carefully, . . .

But similarly don't discount a rigger's advice just because a 'surveyor' contradicts him. There are some dreadful surveyors out there who's opinions about almost anything are worthless. Most don't bother even considering the rig in their normal course of their work, so on what experience do they base their judgement?

As with all things on boats, first evaluate the 'expert', then evaluate their opinion.

So here's something to evaluate! I wouldn't be overly concerned about whether a boat has raced or not. You need to consider a bigger picture. I would first see how she was rigged (T- toggles versus parallel plates, swaged versus Norseman fittings,etc), how well the job was done (alignment, proper use of toggles etc), the history of her use (yes racing, but also extensive voyaging, or a penchant for heavy weather sailing, etc), where she's been used (hot weather exacerbates corrosion (Med and tropics) plus areas of high air pollution aggravates it (Gulf coast of Texas), how the mast spent its winters - unstepped and covered (ideal), stepped and afloat, or stepped and ashore (least desirable), evidence of maintenance (grease/lube where it should be and general condition of the rest of the boat. Once you have a background picture of the rig, a full inch by inch inspection can build on this.

http://www.dixielandmarine.com/yachts/DLrigprob.html

 

[nimbusgb]

Interested as to why you think stepped and ashore is the worst for a mast. My already 10 year old rig has had another 6 stepped and ashore in winter and 2 weeks ago I was sailing in F7/F8. Another boat I know is over 20 years old with a high aspect rig an has had nothing replaced in all that time, also med stored ashore and rigged. No problems either.

Imo an annual unstep/restep places unnecessary stresses on the rig.

 

[vyv_cox]

Life is little to do with "over engineering". Rarely does it break because it is not strong enough, but usually because of stress or corrosion, and in unpredictable ways. Close inspection, particularly around fittings give a good indication of potential failures. Plenty of examples of rigging lasting 30+ years - and plenty of examples of failures in relatively new rigging.

Would suggest you have your rig down and inspected by a good rigger at least, and if planning more demanding sailing replace it. Not expensive in the big scheme of things.

The failed forestay shown on this page http://coxengineering.sharepoint.com/Pages/Fatigue.aspx was only two or three years old. The full story is given on the page but what it does not say is that this was the second, identical failure, both caused by the same defective logic. The boat itself was less than 10 years old and had lost its rig twice.