Rigging on a 1984 E 381

I had my new rigging tuned on my 1984 E 381 by a professional and after he did the tuning the door to the head will not close because the top is now lower above the doors top edge at the doors far end so it will not close shut.

Also, the cover on top of the holding tank now does not easily fit in because the outside fitting around it is nolonger exactly as square as the cover is.

I think that the shrouds and back stay tuning is too tight which is bending the boat. ...But which cable should I loosen to let the boat flex back to it's original shape? Has anybody ever had this problem? Does anybody know how to correct this problem which makes the roof bend down infront of the mast and sides of the boat move forward?

Also I have noticed that after the rig was tuned after rain when water drains down the mast it now drains forward into the shower bildge in front of the mast instead of backwards toward the sturn bildges as it used to before.


Any opinions would be helpful---thank you, John

While I don't have a specific answer, I would be concerned that he might have tuned it a bit tighter overall than necessary, causing the distortion you describe. I would be concerned that if you simply loosen one or two shrouds, they will then be out of tune with the way the rigger tuned the rest of the rig. I had a similar situation on my E30+, and decided to re-tune from the beginning.

Although I haven't got a Loos gauge, I plan to get one, and I think it may be a good start for you. There is lots written about rig tuning, on this site and others, that can guide you--though it still seems to be more an art than a science!

If you aren't familiar with it, the Loos gauge will measure the tension on each shroud, and once you know what tension is appropriate for your boat, you can tune it in, go sailing to check it underway, and make the final adjustments.

If you have tie rods, dont overlook these as well--mine were causing some minor distortion as well.

Good luck!

Frank.

You might have the inside tie-rod that works against the halyard turning block stresses too tight.
The inside tie-rods for the rigging need to be set first with the shrouds unloaded. Tighten them one additional turn after all of the play is removed.
If you use the Loos gauges you will need both models as you have three different sizes of standing rigging. I set my shrouds to approx 20-21% of that particular peice of rigging's breaking strength. Up wind in about 10-12 knots of wind my leeward shrouds are still tight but are almost unloaded. Remember to set the forward lowers 1 to 2% tighter than the rearward lowers to offset mast pumping and to tighten the upper shrouds first, intermediates second, and then the lowers.
Good luck______

Hi,

I am not a rigging expert, and we are fortunate to have several active members on this site who are (and I'm sure they'll chime in). That said, I've learned enough to give you some feedback. If all the stuff below decks is OK e.g. bulkheads strong, tie-rods correctly adjusted (which should have been taken care of by a rigger who knew your boat), none of what you are describing should be taking place. A starting point on most tuning is around 15% of breaking strength, and the 20+ percent mentioned in a prior post would be just fine from what I've heard for a boat like yours. Here's a page to general rig tuning from the Loos wire company. It gives you a good overview of the whole thing:

http://www.loosnaples.com/how-to-use-tension-gauges-pg-11.html

I think it safe to say you need all of your stays and shrouds relaxed, down below checked out, and a retune then from the deck up. Your boat's not supposed to look like a bannana!

New?

Perhaps since new, after a few hard sails it will stretch to normal tolerances? It seems either way they would want check later if not sail with you to finish tuning underway.

If I am understanding you correctly you just replaced all the standing rigging? If so, did you have any problems with the rig before or was it tuned correctly, the boat sailed well, etc? If the new rig was installed and now there are all these issues then I would say something was not done correctly. I have heard that new wire will stretch after it is initially installed so the rig must be tuned/tightened after sailing a few times. I would loosen everything and then start the tuning process from scratch.

FWIW, I am in the process of replacing standing rigging so I will be going through all of this very soon. I made detailed notes of exactly how the rig was setup before so I can hopefully return to that setting.

RT

Rig tension

The first thing to check is the tie down rod in the cabin-if this is really too tight it will pull the deck downwards, and can cause this problem. I would likely just ease it off completely, and if that takes care of the door problem, then snug it up about one turn past hand tight.

Then, as was mentioned, you need to know that dock tuning is only half the job-the rest has to be done while sailing. Do a search on rig tuning-I have some pretty detailed posts here outlining the steps and what to look for-and some of them were specific to the 38. The relative tension between the forward and aft lowers is VERY important, since doing this wrong can cause the mast to invert down low-something the mast is not supposed to do..the aft lowers should be a bit looser than the fwd lowers..again, there are a lot of posts about this topic-look them over and if you have more questions just let me know.

Good luck,
'
S