Slings And Propshafts Question

[charliehows]

I'm mainly curious about boats with a prop shaft exposed just rear of the keel with a cutlass - some of them look like there isn't space for a rear sling unless its fed between the hull and shaft.

[Suijin]

Originally Posted by charliehows

Interesting - how do your guys figure where to put the slings if you don't tell them - I'm genuinely curious because in this part of the world its quite a cooperative sort of operation in my experience.

They won't even look at the specs. If there are no sling stickers/placards they will drop the aft sling behind the boat and move it forward on the travel lift, raising it a bit after it clears the rudder. They can see when and where it hits the keel. They'll back it up a foot or two depending on the design of the boat and that's where they will lift the stern. Seen it done hundreds of times without incident.

And in any decent busy yard, the travel lift operator will have seen a few dozen of your boat before and probably know exactly where the slings go without even going through the above procedure.

On my boat slings go at the traveller and at the forward dorade vent. But I should probably put stickers on just in case, for that time when I'm not there for whatever reason and the boat needs to be hauled and the operator is a newbie...

[SV Bacchus]

When my cat was pulled in December (2017) the lift operator asked:

"Saildrives, right?"

I said "No, shafts"

He then asked "Where are the engines located?"

I said "Under the rear berths, right about here." and pointed to the side port light right by my berth.

He said "OK, got it." and he did.

No issues, just the two of us working together.

[hellosailor]

You can assume the yard's highly trained, highly competent, highly focused and attentive workers will always know exactly where yo put the lift slings.

Just like the way airline and airport maintenance workers, all with their special licenses and clearances, KNOW all about all the standard aircraft they service. Which pretty much all have NO STEP warnings stenciled all over the wings, because a little paint is cheaper than fixing the hole someone's foot made in your wing.

What does it cost to put "HOIST HERE" or six inches of red paint in four places on a boat? More than a propshaft? Less than a beer?