DIY Standing Rigging

[sailjumanji]

Originally Posted by Bpw

Cheaper, stronger, substantial weight savings, more noticeable failure modes, less chafe on sails, easier repair in remote areas, easier to carry spare rigging, and lower static rig loads are all reasons we made the switch.

Wire is great for some applications, but I really think synthetic is the future for heavily used cruising boats.

I raced trailerable trimarans for years. Synthetic was nice there as well, as it was lighter, and nicer on the gel coat vs dragging steel wire across it. However, and I even talked about this to my rigger this week, the life of synthetic is still really an unknown. You can extend by sleeving with a UV resistant cover (which I rarely see). No one that I know of says synthetic lasts longer than steel.

What I really question though is "more noticeable failure modes" you wrote. What does that mean? I have a friend who is on his 10th year of Dynadux, the rigger doesn't recommend going that long, but owner says "it still looks good." At least with wire you get some rust, a strand breaking, etc. With the synthetic, at some time you are going to load the weakened rope, and it is going to break. That would certainly be a "noticeable failure mode", if that is what you are referencing. But you aren't trying to say that synthetic gives you any kind of advanced warning, are you, i.e., provide more notice that it is going to fail? That's my issue with synthetic.

[mikereed100]

This image, shamelessly lifted form Evans Starzinger's article on load testing ( Load testing) shows that 10 years on dyneema single braid will have lost between 40 and 60% of it's tensile strength. When used in rigging, dyneema is sized for creep, not for strength, with the result that it will have a far higher tensile strength than SS rigging in the same application, which will allow for some loss of strength due to UV damage. For example, my cap shrouds are 14mm 1x19 stainless with a breaking strength of roughly 33,000 lbs. My dyneema deadeyes have a breaking strength of 80,000 lbs. After 10 years in the sun, I expect the deadeyes will have a breaking strength of between 32,000 and 56,0000 lbs, still higher than that of the wire, although I will replace them long before that.

Otherwise, if there is chafe or a strand is broken, it will be obvious, whereas with wire one could easily have a microscopic crack in a swage, or broken wires inside the outer layer and not know it. I believe that is what BPW means by "more noticeable failure modes".


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[VinnyVincent]

Speaking of "noticeable failure modes"...

Out of curiosity, how frowned upon is it to just cut the bottom part of the cable off and replace all the hardware with a toggle to extend it, assuming everything above that looks good?

My thought process behind this is that #1; even though the other wire is quite old, by switching to 316 you are losing about 15% strength, so maybe it evens out?

Also, #2; I was reading about how all the new Chinese cable is inferior to the american cable used in the 70's and 80's.
Would this method actually be equal to, if not better than putting in all new wires and upper fittings, provided they all look okay?

Oh and #3; from what I understand the is a certain degree of uncertainty to any new swage fitting, depending on the machine used and who did the work.

[neilpride]

Originally Posted by VinnyVincent

Speaking of "noticeable failure modes"...

Out of curiosity, how frowned upon is it to just cut the bottom part of the cable off and replace all the hardware with a toggle to extend it, assuming everything above that looks good?

My thought process behind this is that #1; even though the other wire is quite old, by switching to 316 you are losing about 15% strength, so maybe it evens out?

Also, #2; I was reading about how all the new Chinese cable is inferior to the american cable used in the 70's and 80's.
Would this method actually be equal to, if not better than putting in all new wires and upper fittings, provided they all look okay?

Oh and #3; from what I understand the is a certain degree of uncertainty to any new swage fitting, depending on the machine used and who did the work.

Hahaha you are quite funy, jesuss,,,, Viny ? lets see..

99% of the boats out there with wire rigging got 316 ss , the days with wire 304 are gone....
You dont need to worry about 316 ss...

Cutting the bottom of the old wire sounds to substandar Budget, why you dont just throw a dock line around the spreaders and Voila hehehe..
No really i dont recomend it, if you have a old rigging is just a récipe for disaster.

You right about chinese stuff around, my sugestion is to ask the rigger about the source of the wire, we buy the wire in Belgium and is ISO estándar, 316 ss not from china ,,but others????

Swages are easy to inspect after swaging, but i dont think you need to worry to, since any reputable rigger out there know what to do, we are talking about your mast and rigging, we dont play **** with this stuff , if you loose your mast by a defective swage after the work is done we are screwed.... Lol . We dont take any risk by norm...

Cheers..

[VinnyVincent]

Originally Posted by neilpride

Hahaha you are quite funy, jesuss,,,, Viny ? lets see..

99% of the boats out there with wire rigging got 316 ss , the days with wire 304 are gone....
You dont need to worry about 316 ss...

I was only mentioning it because Jim had mentioned that my old boat was likely originally rigged and spec'd using 304. Re-rigging to 316 would be using a weaker cable than what was originally spec'd. Not that I am worried about it, but I was just using that reference to compare it to old cable.

Originally Posted by neilpride

Cutting the bottom of the old wire sounds to substandar Budget, why you dont just throw a dock line around the spreaders and Voila hehehe..
No really i dont recomend it, if you have a old rigging is just a récipe for disaster.

You right about chinese stuff around, my sugestion is to ask the rigger about the source of the wire, we buy the wire in Belgium and is ISO estándar, 316 ss not from china ,,but others????

Swages are easy to inspect after swaging, but i dont think you need to worry to, since any reputable rigger out there know what to do, we are talking about your mast and rigging, we dont play **** with this stuff , if you loose your mast by a defective swage after the work is done we are screwed.... Lol . We dont take any risk by norm...

Cheers..

Got it, I have already put down the down payment on the re-rig. I was just curious and asking since there is a lot of good info in the thread and I'm sure others will be reading it for advice.

I notice they DO make specially extended toggles for this purpose.

[neilpride]

Originally Posted by VinnyVincent

I was only mentioning it because Jim had mentioned that my old boat was likely originally rigger and spec'd using 304.



Got it, I have already put down the down payment on the re-rig. I was just curious and asking since there is a lot of good info in the thread and I'm sure others will be reading it for advice.

I notice they DO make specially extended toggles for this purpose.

Hey no offense , i just try to help to, probably your old wire is 304 but no one use 304 this days in the wires , chainplates and other stuff could be, 316 ss is just fine provide you respect the OEM diameter, if you goo for overdimension wires you can run in a set of problems, sometimes is not a big deal if you increase a litle, otherwise to much and you can end overcranking the tensors and streesing the chainplates....

Your boat probably come from the Factory with rod riggig since all of those old C&C`s from that time sport rod rigging, as rule of thumb for me if you know the OEM diameter of the rod or the original wire increasing next size in ss 316 could do the trick, if not, this chart by Navtec can tell you wich diameter on wire can replace the old rod, http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j..._yYp4YmjCevCNA
In other words if your rigger know the size fine, if you want to investigate look for the breaking strenght of your OEM rigging , not the actual 304 , and make the conversión with 316 ss. Yup....

[poiu]

Originally Posted by mikereed100

This image, shamelessly lifted form Evans Starzinger's article on load testing ( Load testing) shows that 10 years on dyneema single braid will have lost between 40 and 60% of it's tensile strength. When used in rigging, dyneema is sized for creep, not for strength, with the result that it will have a far higher tensile strength than SS rigging in the same application, which will allow for some loss of strength due to UV damage. For example, my cap shrouds are 14mm 1x19 stainless with a breaking strength of roughly 33,000 lbs. My dyneema deadeyes have a breaking strength of 80,000 lbs. After 10 years in the sun, I expect the deadeyes will have a breaking strength of between 32,000 and 56,0000 lbs, still higher than that of the wire, although I will replace them long before that.

Otherwise, if there is chafe or a strand is broken, it will be obvious, whereas with wire one could easily have a microscopic crack in a swage, or broken wires inside the outer layer and not know it. I believe that is what BPW means by "more noticeable failure modes".

Colligo size for stretch to match the stainless it is replacing, not creep. It still results in oversized rigging though from a load perspective. I expect creep will be a factor in limiting life with the current Dux product, especially if the rig is pre-tensioned a fair bit. If the new Dyneema Max were used where creep is hugely less then there is little reason why Dyneema should not last even longer than 10 years.

[poiu]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

I don't believe that this is true, certainly not OEM rigging. 304 is the standard wire used, 316 a slightly higher cost option... also slightly weaker as noted. If worried about strength, and wanting to change to 316, the compact strand/Dyform wire of the same diameter is stronger than 1x19, albeit a bit dearer.

And I believe that s/s didn't come directly post manila rope for standing rigging. Wasn't there a long period of non-stainless wire being used? There are still advocates for this practice here in the hallowed halls of CF!

Cheers,

Jim

Some early last century sailing boats had galv wire rigging. It will rust and look awful before it fails and is much less prone to stress corrosion. You could say it is a safer product.

[VinnyVincent]

Originally Posted by neilpride

Hey no offense , i just try to help to, probably your old wire is 304 but no one use 304 this days in the wires , chainplates and other stuff could be, 316 ss is just fine provide you respect the OEM diameter, if you goo for overdimension wires you can run in a set of problems, sometimes is not a big deal if you increase a litle, otherwise to much and you can end overcranking the tensors and streesing the chainplates....

Your boat probably come from the Factory with rod riggig since all of those old C&C`s from that time sport rod rigging, as rule of thumb for me if you know the OEM diameter of the rod or the original wire increasing next size in ss 316 could do the trick, if not, this chart by Navtec can tell you wich diameter on wire can replace the old rod, http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j..._yYp4YmjCevCNA
In other words if your rigger know the size fine, if you want to investigate look for the breaking strenght of your OEM rigging , not the actual 304 , and make the conversión with 316 ss. Yup....

Well, just to clarify... I sent the rigging company my owners manual that had all the sizes of the original rigging listed.
When they did they quote, they did it for 316 and did not increase size even though the original rigging was likely 304. Is this common practice these days when replacing 304 with 316, or should I be concerned?

[mstrebe]

316 is only slightly weaker than 304. Not enough to bother changing diameter unless your boat was marginal already.

As for re-swayging and using a stay adjuster or tang for length--frowned upon? Sure. Effective? Yes. If the swayge is good the result won't be any worse than the rigging was before you cut it. Just be sure the load rating on the tang and pins are over spec. for the load rating.


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[estarzinger]

Regarding, cutting, reswaging, and toggle/extending - will work just fine . . . Just inspect the other end carefully to be sure there is not a failure pending there. But honestly wire is pretty inexpensive.

Regarding dyneema stays . . . . We just plain don't know their expected life. I know in the 16 years we had hawk, we would have lost a dyeema shroud twice one due to rubbing on a wire ship mooring houser in a storm in Iceland. And another likely due to heat/melt from a shore line f#%k up whipping along it in a Chilean shore tie. With dyneema rigging you would just have to be aware of and careful of its greater sensitivity to cutting and heat vs wire.

[Jim Cate]

FWIW: My observation is that forestays most often fail at the upper end, just where the wire exits from it's terminal. This is for rigs with roller furling/reefing on the head stay.

So, Evans' advice to look at both ends is very appropriate. And indeed, wire is not very dear when compared to replacing a lost mast. I know this for a fact!

Jim

[Stumble]

Originally Posted by poiu

Colligo size for stretch to match the stainless it is replacing, not creep. It still results in oversized rigging though from a load perspective. I expect creep will be a factor in limiting life with the current Dux product, especially if the rig is pre-tensioned a fair bit. If the new Dyneema Max were used where creep is hugely less then there is little reason why Dyneema should not last even longer than 10 years.

This is absolutely backwards. Colligio sizes for creep first, then MBL, then stretch. But generally just sizing for creep takes care of everything else. To get creep to an acceptable level (.1 inch/year) the shroud has to be massivly stronger than the wire it replaces (normally), and stretch just won't be an issue once constructional stretch is worked out.

[poiu]

Originally Posted by Stumble

This is absolutely backwards. Colligio sizes for creep first, then MBL, then stretch. But generally just sizing for creep takes care of everything else. To get creep to an acceptable level (.1 inch/year) the shroud has to be massivly stronger than the wire it replaces (normally), and stretch just won't be an issue once constructional stretch is worked out.

No it isn't backwards.

When they sized for my boat it was stretch first and they confirmed the creep and strength was well within what they required. I just checked my emai from them.

Of course the figures all do follow in tandem, so if one is good then they all should be as you are saying, so this is really an academic point.

[Dave852]

Originally Posted by poiu

No it isn't backwards.



When they sized for my boat it was stretch first and they confirmed the creep and strength was well within what they required. I just checked my emai from them.



Of course the figures all do follow in tandem, so if one is good then they all should be as you are saying, so this is really an academic point.

It's sized for creep first always as this dictates the size as the previous poster and I have previously stated.


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