Why's my standing rigging like this?

[AndrewD]

I'm going through my rigging of my 1977 Ericson 27 and can't figure out the purpose of some of the rigging. See the picture below.

The side stay's turnbuckle is extended up 18" or so from the deck and then there's a cable from there going to the aft lower shroud. I should note it has navtec turnbuckles, that's why they look goofy =) I'm planning on replacing the rigging soon and would like to simplify the setup, but now I'm curious what it's function is.

 

[Loren Beach]

My guess....
is that your boat has tabernacled mast base, i.e. it can be pivoted down or "lowered". The extra link in the shroud is for attaching a temporary stay to let you lower the spar and keep it supported side-to-side while doing so. It is hard to find the words, but there are drawings for this for boats if you Google a bit. Common on smaller craft like the old ODay 25, for instance.

My prior boat was a Niagara 26 with a fractional rig and a 34 foot spar. We rigged all the support lines for the mast, "gin pole" (actually our spinnaker pole) and lowered it (verrrrry carefully) twice in the decade we owned that boat. No problems, but it did take some serious planning.

Loren

 

[Mark F]

Hi Andrew,

Loren is right, that is the rigging setup for a tabernacled maststep. You probably have a pelican hook on the back stay also. It is a pretty handy setup to have for dropping the mast and working on the masthead or spreaders.

You can remove the pelican hooks and the small bridle wire on the aft lower shrouds to simplify the rigging. I would be temped to leave the "hinge point" in the cap shroud so you have the option to lower the mast in the future.

 

[AndrewD]

Interesting. We do have a tabernacled mast base, but I didn't realize that was part of the rig to lower it. I'll have to do some more research since I'll probably dropping it before too long. Guess there's a better way than using the boom/halyards and a sacrificial goat =)

Thanks for the info everyone! I'll probably re-rig it the same way now that I know what it is.