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I've pulled my sails off the boat for necessary repairs and am thinking on mast hoops.  My large, squarish mast is problematic for hoops made from a section of pipe as per the plans.

Reading on this though, I came across an old post of mine from 2006 and then looked out my window.  For my flag, I use some light chain (see picture below).  I've got lots of it, what are the thoughts about using that?

Another thought that came to mind was taking some small diameter hose - big enough to run a small line through.  Cut it into sections long enough to make a hoop and then use the line to form it into a hoop and tie it to the sail.....  I saw a reference on another site to someone doing something similar and they were happy with it.

Comments?

Eeeeee, no daddy no, not the chain, not the chain. I can't think of much worse for the mast or sails then this.

Gaskets of line or line with beads are the preferred method for the classic, look.

Ideally you want the least amount of weight for the strength, plus keeping the sail's luff as close to the mast as possible and with as little chafe or friction as possible.

On small craft lacing is traditional. Larger craft used hoops, though I've never seen hoops used on a square mast. Neither keep the luff close to the mast, but they're light and moderate in friction or chafe.

Tracks or sock luffs are ideal, but out of place on this type of build.

Andrew, I made mine out of three strand line and posted info on it in an earlier post: Here's the post:

As I had mentioned earlier on another thread, I made some mast hoops out of 1/4 inch three strand rope. I made an eye splice on one end which I then threaded through the sail and as the splice is too thick to pass through the grommets, I simply tied an overhand on the other side of the grommet to prevent it from rotating around the mast. On the fronts I ran a small, approximately 1/8 inch line, from the gaff jaws on down, tying each hoop to keep them more or less horizontal. I found that if I simply pushed everything up past the tabernacle before launching, the sail went up perfectly and came down equally well. They are tied with a double beckett and I think they're going to work very well for me. Prior to this I had a lace set up with 1/4 inch line. I was never able to get it to stay in place if I pushed it up past the tabernacle and invariably I had binding issues as I raised the sail which caused me to have to go up to the mast to deal with it. A royal pain!

Here are some pics of the set up:



I haven't had them in there very long, but they are working nicely. They do satisfy the desire for reduced chafing and they are easy to adjust for fine tuning. Also, they will be easy to replace.

I found an old car seat with the wood beads at a garage sale. It has yielded me 20 mast hoops so far. I have probably a lifetime supply still left. I used aviation cable, and 1/8 inch joiners, (available at Can Tire). threaded the beads, positioned the joiners, and pressed them in my vise. Made 10 or so in an hour.

Greg

Andrew, I also used a 4x4 fir mast, and 45'd the corners.
Just recently I switched from the barber pole wrap to the "forth and back" lacing, and it is remarkably easier to hoist (and drop) the main.
Have you tried it?

Konrad - yes that's the system I used at launch.  I wasn't happy with how well it held the sail to the mast with the sail reefed - but then I was having lots of problems at the time.  I'll try it again as I work through the repairs but wanted to explore alternatives.

Hoops.... I don't use no stinking hoops! 

I made up some mast hoops today and they seem to work well.  Since the upper part of my mast is slightly larger than the lower section (I built them separately - a truly bad idea) I planed down the joint area to smooth it down.

For the hoops, I took a section of plastic hose, ran a 1/4" line through it, tied it off to make a hoop and then tied that to the sail.  I also put the hoops on before re-lacing the sail to the gaff and boom.  That seemed to work in giving me the proper spacing that I was looking for between the mast and the sail.

The whole thing cost me about 10 bucks and seems to work pretty well.

I also added a flag halyard to the end of the gaff.  I found it to work well as a downhaul, surprisingly I found that if you haul down on the peak that the throat will follow along fairly nicely.  I should now be able to douse my sails quickly.

I made mine and Adlas out of wire and beads from a car seat cover thing as well.  they have heald up very well for being inexpensive and easy to make.

(08-05-2009, 03:33 PM)Andrew_Butchart link Wrote: [ -> ]I've pulled my sails off the boat for necessary repairs and am thinking on mast hoops.  My large, squarish mast is problematic for hoops made from a section of pipe as per the plans.

Comments?

I started out using lacing, It was pretty good but the rope would slip through some loops making it tighter in places and looser in other places. I have switched to plastic zip ties. They make them in a monster 4 foot length with 1/2 inch wide strap and you can buy these at a place that sells home heating and air conditioning supplies. I bought a bag of 100 for $10. I'm also using plastic zip ties on the jib.

The only trick was to put a little super glue on the zip tie once it was the right size. and also, make sure you shave any excess off or it might cut your sail if you leave sharp waste plastic behind after trimming.