In mast re-wiring

[Peter34]

Hi All,


Brand new here. I've read a number of posts (on here and elsewhere) about placing conduit for electrical cables inside of a mast.


My situation is this: I Purchased a '76 Ericson 23 ft sailboat in April last year. Unfortunately, none of the mast electronics are functioning. VHF, masthead light, spreader lights, Wind sensor. I've determined I have power to the cables terminating from in the cabin to the mast step so something in the wiring in mast isn't functional.


I have the mast down and horizontal (29ft). I placed mousing lines for all the in-mast halyards (4 of them) so those are out. I just took off the base cap and inside is a jumble of wires (anchor marine coax plus multiple electrical lines and what looks like a piece of foam about 4 feet up the mast. Can't see beyond that. I can remove all of the electrical lines/coax and place mousing lines in their place.


My inclination is to just replace them all with new lines/cable and move on. However, in the back of my brain there is a little guy saying, "the right thing to do is remove it all including foam and place conduit for the electrical." To be honest, that seems kind of daunting. I really don't like the idea of trying to either rivet a piece of PVC through the mast every so often from the outside. I also don't like the idea of trying to glue a piece of PVC with 5200 to the inside of 29ft of mast that I can neither see nor clean. Another thought I had was to try to find some sort of fabric conduit that all the electrics could reside inside of, but that doesn't have to be adherent to the inside of the mast. Not sure what that would be or if anyone has done anything like that. I've attached a couple photos. Interested in what any of you all more experienced folks would do with this situation? Thanks for any input.

[Jammer]

My advice given the age and size of the vessel is to replace the wries without adding conduit.

[GordMay]

Greetings and welcome aboard the CF, Peter.
I agree with Jammer.

[Thomas1985]

Why no conduit?

I have my mast down and have been working on various maintenance items. Was thinking maybe I should pull new wires as well while its convenient.

My mast has a conduit already. Is that not desirable?

[Kelkara]

I recently rewired my mast ... I had a conduit added, and that was the best thing I've done for the boat in a while. Before I had the wires slapping around inside the mast every time she rolled, which was not only very noisy, but also the wires had almost chafed right through their insulation ... now silence, as the wires stay still in their conduit.

If you don't have a problem with the wires slapping around then maybe leave it as it is. But if you do, conduit is not the only solution, but it is a good solution.

The only problem pulling the new wires through was that the last wire kept snagging on one of the rivets as I tried to pull it through.

[Hudson Force]

I don't have a strong opinion other than making a strong effort to avoid the wiring slapping about with the rock of the boat. My mizzen mast was about the size of your main mast; however, it carried less wiring. I only ran a radar cable and a single antenna wire up this mast. My very successful solution was to tie cable ties with about five inch tails left sticking out. I placed these tails sticking out in varied directions at about every two or three feet. They remained quiet and without any snagging.
My radar cable had been a new addition while the mast was standing. I dropped a fishing line with a small lead weigh down to the opening at the base of the keel stepped mast as a leading line. With a cotton ball tied to a piece of dental floss tied to the weight; I applied a small hand-held vacuum cleaner to the base hole and sucked out the cotton ball.
This remained quiet and snag free for the next 17 years before I sold this boat.

[User 09]

You could put all the wires into one of those foam tubes that they use to wrap hot water pipes, tape it closed so the wires dont fall out and feed it up through the mast. Should help deaden any sound and help prevent any snags with the halyards. Maybe throw a few heavy duty zip ties around it to help keep it sort of centered? Never actually tried this before though.

Masts with dedicated conduit have tracks that the conduit can slide in so you can literally pull the conduit out , put wires in and then slide the conduit back in. Has to be done on the ground of coarse. I would also be a little worried about trying to drill through a mast into a piece of pvc and then trying to get a rivet in that.

[Rucksta]

I built a loom, took it to a rope maker to weave a cover with tails top and bottom.

Cover is tensioned and lays in the mast like a halyard.

Some weight aloft saving over a conduit and the price was nominal.

[wholybee]

I would probably leave it. Unless the slapping bothered you prior. It's a small enough boat it might not have been a big issue. Of course now that it has been mentioned, you might notice it for the first time and be forever bothered.

I wouldn't bother with any soft/unsecured conduit. Foam pipe insulation would be quite large and probably be interfered by, or be torn apart by the halyards in such a small mast.

If I did add conduit, it would be PCV riveted to the inside front of the mast. My mast came like that from the factory, with the rivets filled and invisible from the outside. I don't know how to hold the PCV tight against the wall of the mast to drill and rivet it, but if you manage that then drilling and riveting every 2-3' isn't scary to me at all.

[Nicholson58]

The mast is short enough to simply replace the wires as originally done. That said, avoiding wire slap, premature electrical failure and possible interference with halyards is good reason for a conduit. Make it large enough for easy future wire pulling. Ref: Our mast is 80 feet, two impossibly packed conduits. 6 internal halyards.

Use only ABYC rated wire
Use wire gage heavy enough to be mechanically strong.
Use low impedance antenna wire. This is larger diameter than your likely current wire.

[GordMay]

See Roy M’s excellent [illustrated] instructions, for installing a new in-mast conduit in “Pulling wires through mast conduit”:
➥ https://www.cruisersforum.com/forums...tml#post953042

As an alternative to an internal mast conduit, a set of three cable ties (ty-wraps), oriented at 120° (from each other), with ends left long, forms a 3-leg stand off, keeping the cables from slapping the inside of the mast.
Fix the sets (of 3) roughly every 2 [preferred] to 4 feet up the mast.

[rls8r]

Just a few thoughts ...

If your inclination is to simply re-run the wires/cable inside the mast as has been done before, and if you were never bothered by the 'clacking' - then go with your inclination. It's by far the simplest approach - and it works.

Putting three plastic wire straps every few feet - and leaving long tails on them - is certainly another way to go - but replacing wires/cable in the future with that setup could be a bit of a problem. Pulling new wires (or a new cable) through those tight straps is not the most non-frustrating job there is.

If you decide to run a conduit - don't go to a local hardware store and pick up Sch 40 PVC. Instead - go to a landscaping or irrigation supply house and look for 1" or 1.25" Sch 20 (or 30)/SDR 21/Class 200 PVC pipe. You want a conduit with an OD small enough that it doesn't take up a lot of room inside the mast, but with a large enough ID to allow you to run your various wires/cable - and with walls thin enough that it doesn't add a lot of weight aloft, but thick enough that the rocking motion doesn't rip it off the rivets. Whew! (Trying to understand PVC pipe sizing/classification is a mind-numbing endeavor). Then read RoyM's posting that GordMay linked (and the two comments following it).

While you're at it ... you may want to consider replacing your current VHF cable (probably RG8X) with LMR 400UF (or one of its clones). They're pretty much the same size, but the LMR 400UF has a much lower signal attenuation - so your VHF radio should 'work better.'

[Peter34]

Thanks everyone, for your insight. I decided to go ahead and just re-wire it without conduit, noise hasn't been noticeable in the past. I did order some new LMR-400UF and (hopefully) the correct PL-259 connectors for that cable (along with a soldering tool after reading the marine how-to tutorial).



Follow up question: In the attached picture is where my non-functioning Garmin gWind sensor wire was attached to a mini 7-pin connector. The gWind has 3-wires and there are 4 more wires from something else - I think my masthead light (also not working). Clearly a lot of corrosion and 2 of the gWind wires came unattached.


When redoing this attachment, any advise on avoiding that corrosion in the future? ideal connectors at the base of the mast? Wisdom of bundling multiple devices with one connector (in this case light and wind sensor)? vs just buying Garmins proprietary connector made for the base of the mast and keeping everything separate?



Thanks again!

[rls8r]

I don't know ... I just adhere to the KISS principle. I try to avoid fancy, multi-wire specialty connectors. I could be wrong - but somewhere in the back of my mind I have the impression that Garmin's proprietary fitting is for cabin-stepped masts.

My keel-stepped main mast has a hole about 4" above the step through which the wires and VHF cable exit the mast. I put a rubber grommet in the hole so the wires wouldn't rub directly against the mast. I ran the wires to a terminal block mounted on a nearby beam. Wires are attached to the terminal block with crimped connectors and adhesive-lined heat shrink tubing so none of the copper wiring is exposed. The wires have a 'drip loop' or 'drip bend' - or whatever you call it - between the mast and the terminal block.

That way the connectors don't get wet (and corrode), I can label the wires, and they're easy off/easy on when I unstep/restep the mast. Easy peasy.

[Don C L]

I'll tell you what I did, though I see you may be done already. My solution has been fine. I bundled the wires and every 3 feet or so I wrapped them with some insulating foam, but I taped it to the wires in a cone shape so that as the foam went up through the mast it wouldn't snag on anything. The wires with foam cushions went through fine. There is no slapping at anchor. BUT, I should have taped the bottom of the foam into a cone shape too! Whenever I pull the wires back down, they may get snagged on the way down!