Replacing standing rigging... reuse toggles?

[Boatguy30]

Replace. Turnbuckles also

[CaptainGrey]

Solid bronze toggles shouldn't need to be replaced, if close visual inspection shows no cause for concern. Stainless-steel straps would be gone in a heartbeat on my boat.

I replaced my riga few years ago, and used swaged fittings aloft and Hi-Mod at the lower ends. Dead simple to use, can be taken apart for inspection and reassembled without issue.

[bletso]

Well at least give them a good look. You will never know until....

[Rigger Bruce]

The way and what the insurance companies are doing makes them money and they will refuse to pay out on even reused turnbuckles after an inspection shows them to be ok inspection if they fail. After 49 years of reusing turnbuckles it has come down to making every rerig you should change all the parts of the rigging as you don't know where the weak link lays. They have been hit with a bunch of rig failures in the last few years inthe pacific and though for years and there has been no written rule about having to change the turnbuckles, they are refusing to meet their obligations. If it was a written rule , ok but unfortunately your toggles are going to be going the same way. They are a weak link in the chain and you don't know when your case will be the example they make and not cover you. As for what is right or wrong the weak link is the winner here and a toggle can be just that in their eyes.Though not a written rule like turnbuckles, but they will make someone else pay!!!You or the rigger that didn't change it.

As it is good for my business, I get a sour taste in my mouth having to recommend that you do it . A inspection can show, and a new turnbuckle should have a toggle already incorporated into it.

[waterman46]

Replace the wire and toggles and pins, use Norseman type studs and open frame turnbuckles.

[El Pinguino]

Matt, Let me tell you a little story.......

Now... magazine editors are privy to lots of little bits of information.

I was having a little chat some 25 years ago with George Taylor, Editor of PBO at the time, it was just after my rig fell down at 8yo.

I don't recall the brand , memory says scandinavian, he said that they lasted for years in northern Europe but if taken to the West Indies they had a habit of failing in double quick time even when quite young....

So there you go.... how old is your rig again?

[kryg]

I just had my boat 65' mast re-rigged all toggles where changed, The boats toggles looked like a few years old yet where 30 years old in good repair. However, I discovered that I had toggles with course thread known to fail. also, I changed wire rigging for Dyneema, rigging, dyneema over wire weight savings is 240 kilos dyneema is 30 kilos. cost of the change is the same or cheaper than wire rigging as there are no swagging involved

I recommend though my experience only on rigging my boat it is foolish not change the toggles, x-raying them was far too expensive. Also, if your rig is twenty years old, and now your going to re-rig How long will it be before you change the toggles in ten years? I suggest you think about your mast keeping it where it is as it far cheaper, as well as the crew & boats safety.

Originally Posted by GILow

Hi all,

I am replacing my standing rigging, and I do not know if I should reuse or replace the toggles.

The rig is pretty conservative, 50' mast on a 42' boat, cutter rigged, 10 mm stays all round except for 8 mm intermediates.

Current rig shows no signs of trouble but is just about 20 years old, so time to go.

Tossing up between sta-lok vs swaged fittings at the moment, but that doesn't really affect this question.. at least I don't think so.

Thoughts? Keep or replace?

Picture of the sort of toggle on the boat, they are only fitted at the lower end of each stay, plain eye fittings at the top.

Matt

[GILow]

Hi all, glad to see so many replies, and mostly in the same frame of mind.

Just to be clear, I will be replacing everything.

This has been a bit of a learning curve for me, looking at the toggles on my boat I could not imagine how they could possibly fail, but seeing the photo linked by El Pinguino was an eye opening moment for sure.

Also, as has been pointed out, they are mostly a part of the turnbuckles these days anyway. It took me a while to realise this as I have been stumbling around trying to figure out which rigging bits I need. It seems that the way my boat is rigged, which makes the toggles a very separate part from the turnbuckle, is no longer the way it is done, and I can see the Sta-lok fittings (for example) are a completely integrated unit.

Current plan is to go with sta-lok if I can afford to. Also waiting on a response to a whole stack of emails I fired off yesterday to see if various vendors can give me prices I can afford. Particularly interested to see if the Searig guys in NZ are in my price range because they have now been recommended by a few people I trust.

Either way, everything will be replaced, it just remains to be seen which way I go in terms of swaged or swageless.

Thanks again for all the great responses.

Matt

[RaymondR]

Went through the same process of fairly extensive pondering whilst re-rigging my old boat in 2011 and new in 2016. Went with re-usable ends on the wire in 2011 and was inclined the same way in 2016 until I discovered the magnitude of the price rise during the intervening period.

What decided me to retain the turnbuckles in 2016 is that the wire is 8 mm and the diameter of the threaded SS end fittings 16 mm or double the diameter and the end fittings are solid and not stranded like the wire. If you double the diameter then the area of the section of the larger is four times the area of the smaller.

So I figured that the end fittings and the toggle experienced about one quarter of the stress levels of the wire. Consequent to this rationalization I considered I would only need to replace the turnbuckles every second time I replaced the wire.

Hopefully it will all work out.

[GILow]

Originally Posted by RaymondR

...Went with re-usable ends on the wire in 2011 and was inclined the same way in 2016 until I discovered the magnitude of the price rise during the intervening period.

Yeah, the swageless prices are painful.

I started a month or so ago with a quote of AU$6.5K for supply only to replace all stays and associated hardware used swaged terminals. The deal was I would present each stay to the rigging company and they would make a replacement for me. I could do the job in stages, so leave the mast standing.

I thought that was a bit steep, so started shopping on the swageless fittings with the view of doing ALL the work myself. My first attempt ended up with a price of AU$8.5K and I figured that kinda settled the decision in favour of the first guys.

But a lot of shopping around has brought that down to a bit under AU$6K, so suddenly swageless is looking better again, thought not by much. I am still a bit appalled at the prices.

[GILow]

Originally Posted by Cheechako

Are you replacing the turnbuckles? Won't the toggles come with new turnbuckles?

You are right, it turns out they do. I hadn't quite figured that out when I asked the question, feeling a bit silly now.

[RaymondR]

The 2011 job was very cheap overall because I did not replace any of the turnbuckles and re-used a lot of the existing wire.

The turnbuckles were Weaver Marine from NZ which had an 18 mm thread on the wire swages. I purchased the extended ends with 1/2" UNF threads, cut the 18 mm threads of and drilled and tapped them 1/2" UNF then loktited the 18 mm threads onto the I/E double threaded bush I had created.

The only new wire I used was on the upper, intermediate and lower shrouds, the wire turned out to be the cheapest part.

The 2016 replacement with swaged fittings was about $3k from Yacht Grot in Fremantle and I replaced all the standing rigging on an Island Packet 40. Did the installation myself a couple of wires at a time with the mast standing and it took about 20 trips up the mast. It probably would have gone to $6k if I had replaced all the turnbuckles. Also the A$ was very strong then.

[thereefgeek]

I prefer Hayn Hi-Mod vs. Sta-lok.
We recently re-rigged with new wire and Hi-Mod at deck level, and swaged eyes aloft.
We also changed all the toggles, turnbuckles, and clevis pins.

Consider dumping those closed-body turnbuckles.

[Dougtiff]

Never was a fan of the closed body turnbuckle, for obvious reasons stated, today the turnbuckles come with a toggle attached, unlike year's ago, where the toggle was a separate component, so to answer your question, i would replace the turnbuckle/toggle component, for end wire fittings, Stay-lock type is is the way to go, if you can afford them, allows one to carry some spare wire for an emergency.

[GILow]

Just a quick update on this one. Looks like I’ll go with swageless fittings from Searig in New Zealand. Excellent service and great prices. I can do the whole rig in swageless for 20% less than I have been quoted locally for swaged fittings.