Is this acceptable rust? (Bobstay

[ArmySailor]

Originally Posted by sailingchiro

Good or bad, I have the habit of rubbing a bit of Vaseline above my fittings and let the sun ooze it into the fitting every few months. I feel, if it displaces the water, that must be a good thing for the wire and fitting. Any thoughts?

You know what, this is a good idea. I might throw some lanicote on it after cleaning it properly. I'm a fan of the stuff. I use it on my packing box nut, garboard plug, and a couple other places where salt water tries to muck with metal.

[ArmySailor]

Originally Posted by Sailmonkey

It’s less than 2 years old!!!

It’s just staining. Leave it be and worry about other stuff.

Thanks, it looks like that is the general consensus. I was trying to figure out if it was something I had to worry about in the first place. Rigging is my least knowledgeable area, of all boat systems.



Even though it is less than 2 years old, I thought maybe it was bad install, or poorly formed chunk of 316, something-something. But yeah, I'm not worried about it now.

[ArmySailor]

Originally Posted by Boatyarddog

The fitting may be intact, but right where it meets the wire it looks like the wire has expanded.
This is what rust does as the wire becomes rusty inside it expands.
It's a Bobstay, and shouldn't be to expensive to replace considering what its purpose is.
Replacement will ensure your rig and sprit stays intact.
SV Cloud Duster

Honestly if this thing needs replacing, I'm going to ask the rigger to do it, at reduced cost if possible. I mean, of 20 months, I only sailed her for 8. (Pandemic / work challenges). I know there's no warranty on the stuff. But geez. If it needs replacing after 8 months in water and 12 on the hard... That doesn't sound like routine wear and tear.

[ArmySailor]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

PErhaps true, Mark, but I've not seen much bronze rigging wire around here...

And for the OP: what alloy is the suspect wire?

Jim

Jim,


It's 316 I think.

[ThereAndBack]

FWIW ArmySailor, it sounds like you're doing everything right. You replaced the rigging. You had it done pro. You kept watch on it. You have a concern and are asking for consensus.

Don't let the worry warts and nervous nelly's drive you mad, because they will here. And they'll go down every rabbit hole of doom you can imagine.

Clean up the rust, monitor, if it comes back, get your pro back out there to address it. It is 2 years old, even if it is rusting badly it isn't going to fail tomorrow. You'll get it sorted. Enjoy your boat in the meantime sir.

[Bmorgan562]

Originally Posted by chris mac

I had ours inspected recently, much older, the inspector told me a couple stories of new wire doing that.
Some manufacturers only do marine grade stainless for a couple months, and regular steel the rest of the year. A lot of steel dust is in the air and settles between the wires of the stainless wire. It washes out over time and is fine, but still unsettling. The case he told me about started a warranty claim. They said they would honor it but asked that he wait a year to see if it cleaned up. Which it did and has been great since

So they only produced “marine grade “ stainless for a couple of months of the year. How do ensure what you get ?

[chris mac]

Originally Posted by Bmorgan562

So they only produced “marine grade “ stainless for a couple of months of the year. How do ensure what you get ?

I agree, but realistically when buying anything we have to trust the manufacturer to be honest. Even when buying food we trust the listed ingredients is what's actually in there.
Unfortunately it comes down to supply and demand. If they sell regular steel cable in a bigger volume, then they will concentrate their efforts there.
My rigger did say that he has sourced out a company that exclusively makes marine grade stainless and buys most of his wire from them.

[Sofa King Fishy]

I work for a rigging company~ that’s a lot of rust. Indicating low quality stainless was used.

[Coltrek]

Rust on SS is like cancer, it only gets worse. In your case, I don't think they should have used a fitting like that, it is a catch all for salt, and eventually locks out O2, which is of course bad. If I was doing that bob-stay for my own boat, I would weld up a clevis on one end of Nitronic 50 rod, and have the turnbuckle (Bronze) on the high end out of most of the water.

[caffel]

As a retired rigger I will say that some iron is always left behind by the pressure of forming and clamping tools used when terminating SS rigging wire.

Which is one simple explanation behind what rigging fabricators mean - 'sometimes happens'. They don't all make a habit of passivating the SS after each time its pressed in a hardened steel tool.

I agree that a rod for a dolphin striker would be better especially if used with a toggle to minimize the stress on the rod when you do strike a floating log.

Dolphins being to smart to get struck....

CA

[nofacey]

looking at 4.png, I'd say a fair bit of the rust involved is coming from the bow spirit above...for sure clean up the bobstay, but address the bottom of the bowspirit too.

[lateral]

Contamination could be coming from above which will make the bobstay look worse than it is. I'd clean all of it up with oxalic.

[ArmySailor]

Originally Posted by nofacey

looking at 4.png, I'd say a fair bit of the rust involved is coming from the bow spirit above...for sure clean up the bobstay, but address the bottom of the bowspirit too.

It is definitely not coming from above.
I wish it was, though. Would have been less worrisome / unknown for me.

Now the group has me all concerned about the vendor that the rigger used, whether this professional rigging company used the "wrong fitting".

Crikey.

[Martin Sigge]

I would check out "crevice corrosion". Good luck!

[CarinaPDX]

I would hazard a guess that this is 304 stainless. For a long time all marine stainless wire was 304, but a few decades ago 316 wire started to be used. I have a bobstay with Sta-Loks that I made up many years ago - it looks like yours but shinier and no rust. I tried to special order the few feet of 1/2" 316 SS wire but the local rigger just requested a 5' sample - they weren't going to stock it. I believe that 316 is far easier to find today but there is still a lot of 304 around. Such superficial rust is more common with 304; as others have said just clean and passivate it.

The one question I have is how the Sta-Lok was made up. Recommendations for how to do it have evolved over time but how I did it was, after dry fitting and thus bending the wire around the cone, a blob of sealant was squirted into the fitting before assembly. Also, I used threadlock on the threads, then assembled. I knew I had enough sealant when some excess squeezed out between the strands once the fitting was fully tightened. In that case there was no space for salt water to sit at the top of the fitting. In the OP's case the sealant does not appear to rise that far so the wire just above the Sta-Lok is going to stay wet longer than the rest of the cable, which is why the rust is there. I also see a small amount of light rust at the thread of the fitting which leads me to guess that the rigger either didn't use a threadlocking compound or at least use enough that it filled the threads to the top. Again, this light rust is just the result of having a place for the salt water to sit and is not an indication of a problem. However, using a small excess of sealant and threadlocker probably would have avoided it.

Greg