Rigging Toggles

Rigging toggles are simply connectors placed between the stay and the mast tang. They are typically considered an after thought, since they add between 1.5" to 2" of length to the stay. Typically, if  a stay comes out a bit short, toggles are used to bridge the gap and connect the stay to the tangs. Because of this, toggles have taken on somewhat of a bad image; broadcasting to the world that the stay was measured a bit too short!

The reality is toggles should be used at the mast tang connection, especially with metal rigging! Metal rigging is very unforgiving when torqued, usually resulting in stress cracks. These cracks in combination with crevice corrosion will lead to the early demise of a steel rigged vessel. 

You would think that these wonderful and relatively inexpensive toggles would be in widespread use, but look around and you will rarely see a boat with such toggles. 

Toggles add one more axis of rotation to the stay. When the sail fills with wind and the boat heels over, the mast moves! It might move less than an inch, but it will move laterally. In heavy seas, the boat will be pitching back and forth, and the mast will also scoot forwards and backwards with each wave. The combination results in a mast that will move side to side and fore to aft. If your stays are connected to the tang directly, they would only have articulation for fore and aft movements. Lateral movements would cause stress on the fittings which can lead to premature failure.

The addition of the toggle makes the stay a universal joint so the fittings can articulate fore/aft as well as laterally. This will greatly reduce the amount of stress on the terminal fittings which will extend their serviceable life.

Synthetic stays are much less sensitive to these forces, as they are made of rope which can move around more easily. I reused the toggles that were on my mast for the lowers to place the eye splices in a vertical orientation so that their sides would not be in contact. If I had connected them inside the tang, their sides would have been rubbing, leading to chafe and premature failure. At the masthead, the stays are connected directly to the tang because the space was available. 

While toggles on metal rigging should be considered mandatory, with synthetic rigging, they are considered a convenience item and used to help orient the eye splices as they connect to their mast end fittings.

First Year Inspection

The synthetic rigging has been up and used for the past year now and it's time to perform the yearly rig inspection to make sure everything is holding up well and to identify any problem areas so that they can be addressed before the problem arises.

I did not evaluate the mast head on this climb because I was installing two new check stays for the staysail and time was a concern. I did perform a through evaluation of the lowers and the spreaders.

The stays are holding up very well! I was concerned that the rigging might suffer from chafe aloft when the halyards swing through the wind. If there is any rubbing, there has been no damage from said potential rubbing!

The lowers have settled into their thimbles nicely, with all the strands of the line set neatly within the lip of the thimble. There is no sign of fuzzyness or degredation from UV exposure nor any broken strands. 

One point of relatively low concern is the clevis pin on the aft lower had rotated 180* so the cotter pin is now head down. The legs are properly splayed so there is little risk of the cotter pin falling out, but I still like the cotter pin oriented head up. I tried to rotate this pin, but it was not cooperating with my efforts. Other pins that had rotated were re-oriented to have the head of the cotter pin aiming up, but this one did not and I will have to loosen the stay, climb the mast, orient that pin, and then re-tension that stay. I will first climb to the mast head to inspect the headstay and backstay connections before I worry about a single inverted pin.

The spreaders were my second area of focus. The spreader tip is seized onto the cap shrouds as they pass through the jaws. I wanted to make sure that the small line (5/64" or 1.9mm) has held up well. I did have a few issues with halyards getting caught in the jaws, as well as the drifter rubbing over the spreader tip. To my great pleasure, everything out at the end looked in fine shape with no signs of chafe to the service placed over the stay. If the service were to become severely chafed, I would simply replace the worn service before the stay suffered any damage.

The rigging looks very new and is holding up wonderfully, even in full exposure to UV radiation, harsh winters, and sweltering summers!

On a final note, when you go up the mast to inspect your rigging, don't forget to enjoy the view!

Going up the mast

No one likes to go up the mast, but when you do go up the mast, you should make it as safe as possible. This requires the proper gear and knowledge of how to use it.

There are three important parts to mast climbing

Going Up
Staying Safe
Coming Back Down

---

Going up

Going up may seem simple, but how do you raise all your weight to the top? You can have a trusted friend grind the main halyard winch to raise you up, but if you can't find a friend who is willing to hoist you up, you might have to go up alone. 

They sell many different systems such as mast steps and mast climbers, but these are systems are bulky and complicated.

Metal mast steps add weight aloft, offer more places for halyards to foul, and are very expensive. They also entice sailors to climb the mast without a harness which can lead to deadly falls from the rigging.

Soft mast steps are attached to the main halyard and offer the same problem, you are tempted to climb them just like a ladder without any safety gear.

Mast climbers are interesting devices that attach to a line and allow you to shimmy your way up the halyard. They work well and offer a way to climb the mast in a hurry, but you are forced to stand up there while you are working aloft. Coming down is also rather tricky since you don't want to accidentally disengage the system and plummet to the deck.

I prefer the use of a gantline to climb the mast, it offers the safety and control of a pulley system and attaches to the bosun chair and safety harness. This system consists of three parts, two blocks and an ascender. These parts are not regular marine grade blocks, but rather blocks designed to hoist humans during rock climbing. They can not accidentally be opened and make the process very safe. The ascender is optional but it makes grabbing the gantline much easier.

The double blocks are made by C.A.M.P. and are relatively available at REI.

The ascender is made by Petzl Ascension and also relatively available at REI. I tie a small piece of dyneema to it and connect it to my harness. When I reach my desired location on the mast, I can let go of the gantline and the ascender will hold me in place while I work. The first time you let the ascender go may seem scary, but trust me, you will be fine (as long as it's tied to your harness!)

To go up, I feed the line through the double blocks and attach one block to the main halyard and run it up the mast. The main halyard is securely cleated to secure the upper block at the mast head and the lower block is securely attached to the bosun chair. I attach the ascender to the gantline and begin pulling myself up. This system offers a mechanical advantage of 4:1 and allows someone with weak arms like myself to hoist my heavy body to the top of the mast. If I were to loose my grip on the line and fell uncontrolled, I would be slowed somewhat by the friction imposed by the block system. I don't recommend testing out a free fall, but it will give you enough time to grab the gantline. If you were falling, the best way to stop your fall would be to grab the four lines involved in the pulley system which will easily bring you to a halt. Best yet is to avoid a free fall all together, which will be discussed in the safety section below.

---

Staying safe

Safety aloft is the most important thing to maintain while climbing a mast. With this in mind, we shall look at proper safety protocol.

The line for the gantline should be strong enough to support your body weight easily. I use 1/2" Three Lay from New England Ropes. I recommend the use of Three Lay because it offers more warning to chafe and if chafe occurs, it will usually only affect one of the three strands. Two of the three strands will be enough to hold your weight as you lower yourself down from the mast. If double braid were to get cut or chafed severely, your safety could be severely compromised, three lay is a little more insurance to a deadly fall.

The blocks should be inspected before each and every use to make sure they are free of cracks or corrosion. If there is any question, don't go up on them!

All attachments should be made with knots or threaded shackles. Never use a snap hook as a primary attachment. If the snap shackle opens, you will fall straight down.

The mast is both your friend and nemesis. It will keep you safe as long as you are close to it. If you move too far from the mast by wind or wave action, you will end up smashing back into the mast. This can be extremely dangerous and damaging! To avoid being swung away from the mast, you want to tie a safety line around the mast and to your safety harness. This will keep you close to the mast at all times. If you need to swing out to the end of the spreaders, simply tie it to the shroud and pull yourself out in a controlled manner. Never jump or swing because if you miss your target, you will smash back into the mast!

Attach a safety line from the bosun chair to your safety harness. This way, if you slip out of the chair, you will still hang by your harness. 

Tie the rope ascender to your harness. This way if you let go of it by accident, you will not fall. The ascender will rise up until the safety line is tight, then it will hold you at that height. 

Carry a messenger line with you so tools or parts can be passed from the deck up to you. This will allow you to send things back and forth without needing to climb or descend to retrieve them.

Tie a line that is secured to you to all tools you value. If a tool slips, it will reach incredible speeds as it plummets to the deck. This will damage your deck when it smashes into it and the tool will then bounce into the water to be lost forever. By tying a line to the tool, it will stay tethered to you and avoid all the damaging consequences.

Never use tools while someone is below you. Have any helpers relocate themselves to the bow or stern. If a tool or clevis pin slips out of your hand and hits them in the head, they could die from brain trauma.

If you are replacing your rigging, never disconnect all the shrouds or stays at the same time. Replace just one at a time and have that stay supported by a halyard. This way the mast head will always be supported. The lower shrouds are much less sensitive to this and can be replaced all at the same time.

---

Coming back down

After the job is finished, it is time to come back down to the deck. The safest way to do this is slowly. I take a firm grasp on the gantline and remove the ascender and let it hang by its tether line to the harness. I lower myself down hand under hand, never letting myself build up momentum.

Do not let the rope slide through your hands in a controlled manner. The friction will build heat leading to rope burn. When this happens, your instinct will be to let go! If you save yourself from the fall by grabbing the gantline bundle, you will still have rope burn on your hands, making any successive projects painful. This is why you avoid the whole situation by lowering yourself in a controlled manner until you reach the deck safely.

Lower yourself down slowly, and keep the safety line tied around the mast. When you get to the spreaders: wrap your legs around the mast, make sure there are no waves or wakes coming, untie it, pass it around under the spreaders, and tie it again. If conditions are not calm, use two safety lines. Keep the first one tied, tie the second on the other side of the spreaders, then untie the old safety line.

Following these steps you will be able to safely climb, work, and descend the mast without injury or casualty. Remember that anything you want to do will take longer to accomplish aloft and you need to be extremely careful to maintain perfect safety while aloft.

Making Wide Mast Wedges

Oval mast sections require wide wedges to spread out the forces on the broad side of the extrusion. The problem is wide wedges are hard to come by! Narrow wedges are easily created by cutting wedges off a board of rot resistant wood. Broad wedges are created via bandsaw or by splitting the board along its grain. 

I do not currently own a bandsaw, and if I did, it would not fit on the boat, so I must resort to the other methods of creating broad wedges.

To begin, you must select a board with proper grain orientation. The grain must run up and down the blank of the wedge you wish to create. If the grain runs across the blank, it will not split properly.

Now that the grain is oriented properly, cut out a blank of the wedge you wish to create from your board in the desired dimensions. Now begin to resaw the blank with a handsaw, this will create a notch which your chisel will follow. Resawing is pretty much the same as "cutting the board into a thinner piece" whereas ripping is "cutting the board into narrower pieces".

Now that the notch is cut, place a beater chisel in the notch and drive it through the grain to split the board. The reason you want to use a beater chisel is this will quickly dull a good chisel. 

As you drive the chisel in, the board will split along its grain, separating the board into two wedged shaped pieces.

Some points to remember when making wide wedges:

When resawing, make sure that the width of board is wider than the gap between mast and deck partner. This will ensure that no matter how the board splits, you will not end up with a wedge that is wide enough to secure the mast.

You want a slight taper to the wedge, that way a longer portion of the wedge is mating up to the mast and spreading the load over a greater area.

If a piece comes out too small, keep it! You might need to shim something else later.

Taking Out Constructional Stretch

After any splice in dyneema, the outer braid will be more open. Upon loading, the fibers will settle back into place and the line will stretch. This is not creep, it is "constructional stretch". It is important to get this constructional stretch out before setting up the stays as it will ensure that the final length is closest to the desired length.

To get constructional stretch out, I like to tie an end to a fixed object and then pull really hard on the line, snapping it tight and letting it go, then snapping it tight again. This will take out most of the stretch. The last bit of stretch can be taken out during tensioning with the deadeyes.

I'm in the process of making new check stays for Wisdom. I connected two off-cuts that were rather long with a very long end to end splice. My next step will be to take the long lines and measure them on the mast to set the eye splices in the desired locations. The problem is the constructional stretch is an unknown factor on these lines. It is very difficult to get the length of the stays perfect with such a large unknown in their length. For this reason, I am going above and beyond with removing the stretch from the stays. 

Pulling hard on the line will remove most of the constructional stretch, but if you want to get all the stretch out of the line, this additional method will be necessary. While this method will remove the stretch and minimize the amount of creep you have to deal with, it is not necessary to do with all your stays. I only did this method on the headstay and the cap shrouds as I didn't want to worry much about them stretching on me once set.

To tension the stays, you first need to attach the stay to a very secure object. I use a silver maple tree that has a very extensive root system as my anchor point. Tie the stay to the tree with a small dyneema line, being sure to do various wraps around the anchor point. The small line is not as strong as the large line you are tensioning, so multiple wraps are needed to share the load.

If you are using a tree, be sure to set a sacrificial board on the backside of the tree. This will spread the load and keep the tree alive. Thousands of pounds pulling into the bark would be very damaging to a tree.

Next attach the other end to something rather strong and heavy. I like to use my pickup truck, it weighs just over 7,000 lbs and has a very sturdy tow-ball on the back of it.

The line is laying on the ground and properly secured to the tree and the truck, now we just need to apply some tension to the line. I put the truck in gear and begin driving down the hill away from the tree at a very slow speed (less than 2mph) until the line gets tight and stops the truck. 

At this point, I put the truck back in park and check the splices.

Even under this amount of tension, the outer braid can be bunched up and not relaxed yet. This is when you can work the line out and push the fibers into their appropriate positions. I let the truck hang on the line for a few hours and then put it in gear and creep forward a few more inches, then let it hang on the line for a few more hours again.

Since these stays need as much creep and stretch removed from them, I let the truck hang on the line for a few days. This will get all the stretch out of the end to end splices and give me a very accurate length to measure my stays with. 

If you noticed, I'm also tensioning the deadeyes at the same time. I know the system has been exposed to enough tension when the thimbles close and their ends come together.

If you need to get the stretch out of your new synthetic stays and don't have access to very large hydraulic equipment, just know that there are always more simplistic ways to achieve your goals.