Lena
Invader 22
Oct 05 - Progress home allsorts ***
With working pretty long hours and the nights drawing in - it feels I have not acheived much lately - but that said, I have had the mast up for a trial run with the old rigging - and have sorted out the masthead setup. - see here.

I'm off work now for about a week, so tomorrow I take the gear to Bristol Rope & Twine for the first half of the new rigging to be swaged up. I'm rigging it with new main shrouds, forestay and upper backstay, plus the new bridle for the babystay - then will temporarily use the old lowers, backstay bridles and a modified babystay, with the old turnbuckles. Its a matter of getting the mast at the right rake - it's easy enough to measure the lowers/babystay/backstay bridles, then change them over for the new stuff with the mast still up.

I've spent a great deal of time loking into a new roller unit. Have checked out in some detail on Plastimo, Profurl, Harkin et al. I eventually convinced myself that what I had was actually rather well made - especially the foil.

Many of the models in question suffer from problems with the foil connections - in that they are one section that is butted together. Mine is totally different - in that it's constucted from two halves, which slide together over their entire length, the joins being staggered - ie, you start with a half length of half the section, then slide on a full 10' length of the outer, then slide on a full 10' of the inner, etc - so there is no way the foil groove can twist out of line.

The two concerns I had - given that the system actually contains the forestay, which swivels with the sail and halyard - was the top unit lug, and also was not happy with the capacity of the drum. So I 've reinforced the top lug and increased the size of the drum cheeks. I've already stripped both units right down to the ball bearings - they are very simple and very well put together - no plastic here, everything is either stainless or some sort of high grade alu alloy.

I'm pleased with the new drum - it wasn't too difficult to modify and now takes 8 - 9 metres of 6mm line easily .

See here for the top unit refurb -

its just two cheeks of the grp I cut out of the hatch opening, through bolted with M3 machine screws and nylocs, Duralac'd in - then the two guard posts, which are now rigid to the spindle just above the clevis fork - and are simply M8 bolts with a loose fitting plastic tube. Its not totally finished here and I can probaly make the fixing holes out into more of a slot, so, with spring washers/nylocs the posts have some slight adjustment if necessary.
Finished top unit on the right - with new reinforced lug.