Well we are back on the water for our 2nd season, with a few mods, The big one is installing a winch to rise & lower the mast, Last year it became a major headache and at times I almost had a case of mutiny on my hands with my 1st mate, it got that way she just as soon stay home. I considered installing an aluminum mast, but then I found a winch at Harbor Freight complete with a remote for under $100. I installed the winch in the front hatch on the under side of the deck. I dropped a 40 inch piece of 1 1/4 Galvanized pipe mounted on the top of the keel and up though the deck just in front of the mast box, into this I slide a 7ft piece of 1 inck pipe with a pully fitted at the top. It works great I am able to stop the mast at any point to make sure all the lines and shrouds are behaving themselves.
 Part Two.....   I also followed Keith Shergold's lead and did away with my club foot setup,at the same time I rigged up a home made jib furler, with 1" PCV pipe and an old wire reel, Again it works great, I can open and close the jib from the cockpit. I also added a peice of deck over the bowspit so this 72 year old can work on the jib without going for a swim.
  Part Three...... I up graded the power supply with a heavy duty power pack, so the 1st mate can use her hair dryer after swimming.
That looks like a pretty healthy generator there.....You use the winch or maybe photo shop to get it up thereÂ
Looks like a beauty! I too am considering a roller reef for my vacationer jib; would love to see some details on how you built it up?
I'm still at the hull building stage so won't be up to there for a while yet!
Cheers
Gerrard
Hi Gerrard & Bob, Will post some pictures of the furler at a later day, The power unit I have had in one of my work trucks for some time now, it is both 12 volts & 110 volts. Have been able to use power tools for over an hour with a charge, Weighs about 65lbs but I can use the extra weight up front, also going to keep the std battery just for the winch.
I guess pics can distort things,it looks Huge....
Like the jib furler,have seen many pics of similar setups,would appreciate any details you can share as well.
Bob.
I have a on board system on the boat I'm working on. It has a tabernacle and a long mast (26'), which has lots of leverage over the short end. So, at the very bottom of the mast, I installed an eye bolt through the base, on the centerline. On top of the centerboard case is a cheap trailer winch. I pull out slack on the winch and hook it to the eye then start winding it up. The initial load is huge, so I usually prop up the mast onto my shoulder so the winch does try to hank it's mounting bolts out of the centerboard case, but once is up to say 15 degrees past horizontal, it get progressively easier.
The nice thing about this setup is I can lower the mast at will on the water or trailer, with complete control. This boat is undergoing some renovation currently, but I'll try to remember to post some pictures of this feature some time.
The only improvement I would make to this arrangement is to move the winch from the centerboard case to the bottom, back side of the tabernacle itself. This would place all the loads on the tabernacle and I wouldn't worry about the board case, plus it could remain in place underway if you have room for it.
I take it that "happylee" is going to be immediately banned from the forum.
and I just gotta go out and get me a new prada handbag it will go so well with the new Vacationer I'm building, how about the rest of you guys.
stuff like this ticks me off to no end, some ppl are such idiotsÂ