e25 masthead

[Joe]

Attached is a picture of my e25 masthead and the sheaves and spacers contained within. The boat still has the original wire/rope halyards. A previous owner must have added the extra (white) spacer shown -- causing a very tight fit. The sheaves were obviously not rotating as can be seen by the friction marks on the spacers and within the sheave tracks. Before I throw the extra spacer out, I thought I'd better check whether there was an obvious reason the extra spacer was added: perhaps the wires were jumping the sheave tracks?

Thanks...
Joe Williams

[Loren Beach]

I have had the wire jump the sheave on other boats and jam. It caused a trip to the masthead... and if your sail is still hoisted, you have other potentially damaging problems looming. It can make for an ...interesting...day on the water. :rolleyes:

You want to keep the space beside the sheave to a minimum, and then change to all-rope halyards to further prevent the problem. On your boat that new line could easily be a quarter inch or 5/16 at the most.

My .02 worth,

Loren

[raslocum]

My halyards jump the track on my e-25 quite regularly, causing 4 trips up the mast in the last six months. I just dropped my rigging last weekend for maintenance, and i suspect I'll be doing some type of similar process that your previous owner did.