Hood23 rigging

Hey all.
My son just bought a Hood23 for his first sailboat but I've been told we can call this a yacht so we are telling everybody, ( In posh voice, while holding our snifter of brandy), Yes, we own a yacht..

Anyhoo, the bloke we bought it off knows very little about the yacht he bought years before and did nothing with.

So my son and I are fumbling through the rigging and I stumbled across a search from this website about a Hood23 someone had a constitution for but I can't reply to because it is too old.

Soo, I'm starting a new thread hoping the champion gentle person will reply and we can work out where these sheets are supposed to go.

Already worked out the main and jib halyard( We think) but just watched a video on reefing the main and he had many more sheets than we have.

Really looking forward to getting some water under the hull soon so any help appreciated .

Red sky at night...

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GREGTED22 said..
Hey all.
My son just bought a Hood23 for his first sailboat but I've been told we can call this a yacht so we are telling everybody, ( In posh voice, while holding our snifter of brandy), Yes, we own a yacht..

Anyhoo, the bloke we bought it off knows very little about the yacht he bought years before and did nothing with.

So my son and I are fumbling through the rigging and I stumbled across a search from this website about a Hood23 someone had a constitution for but I can't reply to because it is too old.

Soo, I'm starting a new thread hoping the champion gentle person will reply and we can work out where these sheets are supposed to go.

Already worked out the main and jib halyard( We think) but just watched a video on reefing the main and he had many more sheets than we have.

Really looking forward to getting some water under the hull soon so any help appreciated .

Red sky at night...

And congratulations on buying a fantastic little boat. Great big cockpit, great visibility forward plenty of deck space and simple maintenance without inboard diesel hassles (or difficult to use outboard wells). My dad had one and we had lots of fun as teenagers on it. Perfect boat for a day out on the harbour which is all that most people do anyway. Watched them being built at Spit Bridge Marina.Such a shame that their attributes are never highlighted in ads but they are instead insultingly advertised as "Mooring Minders" :(. The upside is bargain price :).

Thanks all for the replies.
I have included some pics ( We all love pics of boats ).
We have worked out the rear stay and attachment points on the stern.
Forestay and attachment point on the bow.
Side stays ( or shrouds ). 3 each side.
Now what we don't know.....
On the mast port side is a sheet that we think is the main halyard. It seems to be connected to the longest sheet that goes to the rear so we have that on the rear of the boom atm.
We have 2 sheets exiting each side at the base of the mast and several connection points of unknown origin and purpose at the head of the mast.
We have 2 front sheets exiting the top of the mast and one seems to be connected to the jib halyard and the other seems to be jammed and won't move. ( I think the outer braid of rope is delaminated and is jamming). No the good type of jamming as in Red Hot Chilli Peppers either.

At the top of the mast is a d shackle and cable that is a mystery but seems to be connect to one of the sheets at the base.

Have tried to add he photos with the caption Hood23 rigging.

Hope it works

Greg.

Hey Gary,

Sorry I forgot to answer your questions.

Not sure if we have all lines. There seems to be 2 sheets coming out the base of the mast on each side. One of the port sheets at the base is connected to a sheet that reaches from the top of the mast and disappears into a hole near the top. We think this is the main halyard. The other port sheet goes to a steel cable ( stay ? ) that travels inside the mast and also exits from the rear of the mast head to a d shackle. We think this connects to the rear of the boom. ( Topping lift ? ).

Part way up the front of the mast near the spreader bars is a pulley where one of the starboard sheets exits. That is connected to one of the sheets at the starboard base of the mast. We think this is the storm jib. ( The sheet is smaller diameter than the rest ).

The other starboard sheet is also connect to a steel cable somewhere inside the mast.

So we have 2 full length sheets and 2 sheets connected to cables inside the mast each side.

We do not have a roller furling.

We do not have a pile of sheets.

We do not have a bag of pulleys. Just the ones already connected.

We do not have a boom vang.

We seem to have 7 sails. 2 mains ( with plastic things to travel in the track of the mast ), 1 large Genoa ( maybe spinnaker ? ), and 4 Jibs.

Expecting a storm atm so will raise the mast this weekend and check out the sails.

Have posted some pics ( I hope )

Greg

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GREGTED22 said..
So, I just found out that as a new member I cannot upload photos...

Guess I'll have to wait a bit....

Wire halyard spliced to synthetic tail will be the sail halyards, main and head, The one going up the mast and disappearing into a hole near the top would probably be the topping lift and the one exiting part way up the forward edge of the mast would be a topping lift for a spinnaker pole, or at least that would be my best guess.

Thanks UncleBob,

So now we know. The synthetic spliced ones are sail halyards.

Learning, learning. Just keep swimming..

Greg

Hi Greg
I think you have to have 10 posts before you can upload photos. maybe more, so keep posting and trying.

Ropes

As you probably know each rope on a boat has a name. And the old saying is that the only rope on a sailing ship was the bell rope.
Ropes are usually called lines.
I will not confuse you with a long list, but here are a few lines.

Halyard.
In the old sailing ship days most sails were connected to a long wooden spar that went across the ship.
This was called a yard and the line that hauled it up was a halyard.
So the lines that haul your sails to the top of the mast are your halyards.

You will have at least 3.
The foresail halyard.
The mainsail halyard
The spinnaker halyard.

Older mainsail and foresail halyards were wire at the sail end and polyester braided line at the handling end.
The wire is there to alleviate stretch. These halyards usually run inside the mast and exit at the base.
The spinnaker halyard will be braided line and will run outside the mast.


OK. Now you have hauled your sails up you need to control their shape and position.

Sheets
The shape and position of the sails are controlled by lines called sheets, They will be braided line.

Foresail sheets.
From the back corner there will be two sheets that come back to the cabin.
One on the port side and one on the starboard side,
If you pull either one it will pull the sail in and change its position and shape.
A lot of power is needed to control these sails when they are full of wind and that is whet the sheet winches are for.

Mainsail sheet.
The mainsail is controlled by one mainsail sheet.
This is connected to the boom and has 4 to1 or 6 to 1 purchase block system to handle the power needed.

Lifts / Topping lifts.

Back to the old sailing ships.
The yards needed to be lifted to control them They were called yard topping lifts.
So the lines that lift your boom and you spinnaker pole are lifts.
The boom topping lift and the spinnaker pole topping lift.


There you have it.
Halyards, sheets and topping lifts.

gary

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GREGTED22 said..
Hey Jules,

Thanks for the reply.

There is a track and some pulleys ( blocks ? ) on the port side of the boom.

Are they for the main sail reefing sheets? The main sails that came with the yacht have 2 reefing lines..

If that is the case, I guess we need some reefing sheets. How do they attach and where do they run?

From videos and forums, it looks like the reefing sheets connect to the boom, then travel through the reefing outhalls back to the blocks on the track, then forward to the front of the boom and through another block back to the helm.

Am I anywhere near correct?

Greg

Hi Greg.

Yes you are correct that the track and blocks on the side of the boom are for reefing and in particular to secure what will become the new rear bottom (clew) of the sail.
During reefing the new front lower corner of the sail (tack) also needs to be attached and secured (before the rear) and the blocks, track and ropes (called lines not sheets) have nothing to do with securing the tack.

On your boat I don't think anyone goes to the complication of leading the reefing lines down from the front of the boom to the deck then back to the cockpit. You have to go up to the mast anyway to lower the main halliard a bit and secure the new tack. You have a nice wide flat (although heeled over) deck to stand on while doing this. The topping lift must be on whilst doing this and the main sheet eased a little.

Now to the track, reefing lines and blocks necessary to secure the new clew to the boom. The lines run from the boom ( in your case probably an eye formed as part of the block)under the boom then up through the clew cringle (not called "outhaul" as outhaul is a rope or wire that pulls the clew cringle backwards) then back down around the sheave in the block then forward along the boom to a cleat more towards the front of the boom.

The blocks should be set on the track about 60mm behind the clew they relate to.

The arrangement should look like the attached picture. You hopefully have the cleat(s) on the boom and you will need two (8mm or maybe 10mm) reefing lines.

Reef early as its difficult in high winds.

Hope this helps.

Thanks Jules,

That information and those drawings are just what I needed and you just answered my next question which was what size of braid to buy.

I have seen 10mm polyester dbl braid on ebay for $1.95/m. I can buy a roll of 70m for $80 which would work out to be half price but that would give me the same color for all and I think we would like different colors for different purposes. Just to make it easier for us beginners.

Do most of you use the same color or different colors?

I have seen on some sites that they recommend 8mm for some lines and 10mm for others. Is this just a cost saving measure and if so wouldn't it be easier to just buy 10mm for all lines and have them stronger? From what I've seen, the 10mm is not much more expensive.

Our current lines/halyards are very thick but I think they are very old and probably frayed so that would make sense.

Another thing I would like to know is our current halyards are hybrid? cable and braid. Was this an old idea before modern braids became strong enough to handle the loads?

Once again thanks for all the information. This is helping us a lot.

Greg

I use this bloke for any rope:

ropegalore.com.au/o10mm-double-braided-yacht-rope-multi-colours/

You are better off to have different colours for different lines!!

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GREGTED22 said..
Thanks Lazz,

I checked out that site. That works out to be the same price as our local supplier at $2.20/m for his cheapest buy.

On another note. Found a site that gave guidelines for lengths of lines/halyards.

Premium ropes..

That has helped a lot but they state the main sheet should be Boom length x (purchase +1).

Can't seem to find out what purchase plus 1 means.

For halyards they used to use wire for the bulk of it and the synthetic tail to work it. Wire doesn't stretch, which is exactly what you want so for their replacements you will need a higher tech non stretch rope, which is rarely found on flea bay.

Just found the Ronstan site and it looks like we need 4 x Rf 51500 blocks for our boom main sheet and vang.

These have max diameter of 10mm which will tie in with our new sheets.

Or 1 x 51500 and 1 x 51530 for each main and vang.

Only $403.64 to add to the shopping list.

Not too bad so far. $70 for 80m of double braid plus the blocks at $403.64 equals $473.64.

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JonE said..
I think Ronstan would be overcapitalising.

www.ebay.com.au/itm/261714287895

This gear isn't too bad - I'm using a fair bit of it.

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GREGTED22 said..
Thanks Lazz,

I checked out that site. That works out to be the same price as our local supplier at $2.20/m for his cheapest buy.

Yeah but .............................. you can buy different colours in the lengths you want so you will have designated colours for different lines AND you will have decent rope that will outlast fleabay stuff.


BTW if you're gonna count out every dollar I don't think you're ready for a boat!! I'm not saying don't look for bargains ...............BUT!!
I bought a lot of second hand stuff when I was setting up my boat off eBay etc. Is there a second hand chandlery near you??

I have bought a few of the Master tagged blocks and the quality is first class.

SLOW DOWN Greg
( Greg! The Stop Sign! if you are into TISM)


Sometimes top shelf is a bargain in the long run an sometimes it is overkill.
Sometimes cheap low quality braid is just that. The famous stuff from the big green shed lasted about a week. Not so cheap.
I mean the braid . don't know anything about the Dynema that Shaggy mentioned.

I would strongly suggest that you hook up with another or some other Hood owners. They will have been through what you are facing and will be able to put you straight with gear.

As JonE said
Whereabouts are you located? Somebody probably has one in a bucket of bits.....

There is nothing worse that hearing, "Why didn't you tell me you were after a ...... I've a half a dozen the shed that you can have."
PAINFUL after you have spent ya dough.


Gary

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woko said..
Gary that's gold Greg we are test rigging a little hood ? Over the years i have experienced some different braids from the big green shed & the quality has been from fall apart immediately to a stretchy but reasonable for price life span job to an almost indestructible weathers well but hard as hell lucky to bend around turning block job. You have the running rigging ? At least some of it ? Rig the wee beast with what you have, buy a roll of 8mm three strand poly to cut for whatever you need, I keep a roll around invaluable for an indescribable amount of tasks, lashings, kedgeing, impromptu halyards, a line for the bucket, some thing to tie your pants up if the button pops. You get my drift, I wouldn't use it on the main sheet if I was racing but I would use it to figure out just how long the main sheet should be. It's a great adventure enjoy

Got me worried now woko have you used this? For main halyard on PR25. If no good I can use it for other running rigging not halyards. thanks.

www.bunnings.com.au/grunt-10mm-x-30m-high-strength-rope_p4310554