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CharmCityBoater · 10-04-2023, 08:20

Yet another one of these threads...

I have the stick down and getting ready to order all new standing rigging. Boat is a Hans Christian 43T. I have been told it is getting very hard to find good quality stainless steel wire that is not made in China. I was opposed to using something like heat set dyneema but starting to consider it now due to the fact good stainless is becoming more of a challenge. My questions:

1. What is the current thinking around the right places to order high-quality stainless-steel wire / rigging with swages at the top.

2. Is synthetic rigging still a higher cost than SS? 4 years have passed since I last looked into this and was curious what the current wisdom of using synthetic rigging on a cruising sailboat is. Has it changed?

Thanks

Nauticatarcher · 10-04-2023, 13:45

Just rerigged my Norseman 447 with Dynice Dux, it’s my second boat that I have changed to synthetic, very hard to go back to wire after making the change, as I did it myself it was probably half the cost of paying a local rigger

Chotu · 10-04-2023, 14:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nauticatarcher

Just rerigged my Norseman 447 with Dynice Dux, it’s my second boat that I have changed to synthetic, very hard to go back to wire after making the change, as I did it myself it was probably half the cost of paying a local rigger

We're there some guides and books or documentation you used to learn?

fxykty · 11-04-2023, 16:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chotu

We're there some guides and books or documentation you used to learn?

Colligo’s site is pretty good, and if you buy the terminals from them then John Franta will walk you through all the calculations and techniques. We use Cheeky Tangs up top (replaces all the tangs) and Terminators to turnbuckles at the bottom.

The trickiest part is getting the length right, particularly if you’re planning to use turnbuckles. We ended up re-splicing the bottom eyes on both cap shrouds. After three years, no further movement.

CharmCityBoater · 11-04-2023, 18:19

So, here is the thing…. I get a lot of people telling me I’m crazy to consider synthetic rigging. They say it stretches too much, or it can be cut with a steak knife or it chaffes and degraded too fast in the sun…

But then I try to find the horror stories and all I hear is crickets. No one telling me thy tried and went back to wire. No one saying they had a rig failure. No one telling me how it was too hard or took too much effort. In fact, I hear people say they would never go back to SS wire.

So, where are all the horror stories if synthetic rigging is so bad?

GILow · 11-04-2023, 18:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by CharmCityBoater

Yet another one of these threads...

I have the stick down and getting ready to order all new standing rigging. Boat is a Hans Christian 43T. I have been told it is getting very hard to find good quality stainless steel wire that is not made in China. I was opposed to using something like heat set dyneema but starting to consider it now due to the fact good stainless is becoming more of a challenge. My questions:

1. What is the current thinking around the right places to order high-quality stainless-steel wire / rigging with swages at the top.

2. Is synthetic rigging still a higher cost than SS? 4 years have passed since I last looked into this and was curious what the current wisdom of using synthetic rigging on a cruising sailboat is. Has it changed?

Thanks

Is the boat currently rigged with continuous or discontinuous shrouds? I ask because with my discontinuous rig I’m planning on stainless for just the lower section where chafing might be an issue, and synthetic for pretty much everything else except the forestay and staysail stay, both of which have furlers.

Like you, I’m not hearing of real problems, lots of “aaarrrhhh, you’ll be doomed” from the old school crowd and lots of “I’m never going back to stainless” from those that have made the shift.

GILow · 11-04-2023, 18:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by CharmCityBoater

Yet another one of these threads...

I have the stick down and getting ready to order all new standing rigging. Boat is a Hans Christian 43T. I have been told it is getting very hard to find good quality stainless steel wire that is not made in China. I was opposed to using something like heat set dyneema but starting to consider it now due to the fact good stainless is becoming more of a challenge. My questions:

1. What is the current thinking around the right places to order high-quality stainless-steel wire / rigging with swages at the top.

2. Is synthetic rigging still a higher cost than SS? 4 years have passed since I last looked into this and was curious what the current wisdom of using synthetic rigging on a cruising sailboat is. Has it changed?

Thanks

Regarding cost, I compared stainless with swageless terminals to synthetic and the costs were the same. Doing all the work myself of course. I don’t know, but I suspect you will pay more if you use a professional rigger thanks to supply and demand. I’m guessing there are plenty of stainless riggers but not many synthetic guys.

The Colligo site was full of very useful information.

markxengineerin · 11-04-2023, 19:03

I wouldn't expect a lot of stories of people bashing anything, especially after spending a lot of $ on their own decision. I've had synthetic rigging for about 6 months of full time cruising now. Downsides: Chafe can be a problem, and is one more stressor on a cruising boat full of things to worry about. My poorly rigged radar ball started to wear through an upper shroud before I caught it, close call on my first night of sailing with the new rig. Tension variation vs. time remains poorly understood in comparison to wire. I've been studying it but don't have enough data yet. There is no published data about tension vs. temperature, and this will change with hull and mast structure and materials of each. Same can be said for steel rigging , but it's likely more of an issue with synthetic rig, and there's less history of it being "ok" across many more boats. I also wonder about young's modulus of the dyneema vs. temperature, again haven't seen any data. A synthetic rig is a ton of work to DIY, only worth it if you are interested in learning as I was, otherwise Colligo splicing is a cost effective choice. You still might measure/guess wrong on lengths. The majority of the few reports I've read (and I'm only talking about 2 or 3) admit to making at least 1 mistake and having to re-do a splice or a shroud. It happened to me, took some extra time. Does anyone have data for what happens in a lightning strike? I definitely worry about that more than I used to w/ steel rig. Windage, if you care.

Plusses: It's novel and cool while also being old-timey in a way, it's lighter, it's cheaper to re-rig. I don't think it's cheaper the first time conversion from wire, when you include all the new fittings. This might change in the future as price of dyneema and stainless fluctuate. It's arguably easy to inspect which is nice. There have been unexplained failures of dyneema topping lifts. There's at least one long thread about it on this forum, but so far no reports of anything similar on shrouds that I know of. My topping lift vibrates a lot, as most do, maybe something to do with that. I don't recall if there was obvious signs of aging before those failures, but I want to say there was not. The way most people size it, it's stronger than the steel it replaces. I am confident my mast is more resistant to a brute force based dismasting than it ever was before I did this work, say in violent wave/rollover situation.

Chotu · 11-04-2023, 19:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by fxykty

Colligo’s site is pretty good, and if you buy the terminals from them then John Franta will walk you through all the calculations and techniques. We use Cheeky Tangs up top (replaces all the tangs) and Terminators to turnbuckles at the bottom.

The trickiest part is getting the length right, particularly if you’re planning to use turnbuckles. We ended up re-splicing the bottom eyes on both cap shrouds. After three years, no further movement.

Thanks for that. I know at first, just to get going on my first stab at the rigging here, part of my rigging did come from Colligo. just a little part.

we are doing my rigging as a first draft. Then I go try it out for the summer. Then I come back and we make adjustments and changes based on actual use.

Dantp · 12-04-2023, 04:35

We are going through a similar decision process.
We are going to go with swagless fittings and stainless.
Both options are DIY.

Our reasons are:
Chaff from Genoa sheets on cap shrouds and baby stay
(Dyneema chaff guard is the solution but adds to the cost and makes re-splicing the lengths harder)

After splicing the shrounds need pre tensioning to bed them in.- hard to find a good place to do this while cruising. I can remake a stainless shroud in any bit of flattish ground.

Still have to buy turnbuckles - we have a removable forestay tensioned with colligos tensioners. I can imagine how hard it would be to tune a rig with these.

Dyneema availability/cost. In the UK dux or other recommend for standing rigging alternatives are very expensive.
If a need a new cable half way round the world I think currently stainless (or galvanised at a push) is easier to find.
I don't want to spend the money on a whole spare set of dyneema to carry. I can still carry 1 backup dyneema shroud.

I'm a little wary of pushing the lifetime if dyneema past 7years in the tropics so next re rig is earlier.

I do like the idea of dyneema a lot though. It wasn't a clear cut decision. I think for some it is a great option.
Maybe it would be the best option for us and we are about to miss out.

Benz · 12-04-2023, 17:30

I'm about to re-rig my boat, which has had Vectran standing rigging for the last twelve+ years, with DM20. All the manufacturers say it's the cat's meow for creep, but I haven't heard of a single boat using it for standing rigging.

So I guess I'll be the guinea pig. I'll report on it in my blog.
I'm afraid I may not be too inspirational to the DIY-er, since I have a lot of practice with complicated splices, and I'll be adding compliation by covering the whole of each shroud with Dyneema sleeve, but at least I'll have a sense of how it holds tune and behaves underway.

fxykty · 13-04-2023, 05:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by Benz

I'm about to re-rig my boat, which has had Vectran standing rigging for the last twelve+ years, with DM20. All the manufacturers say it's the cat's meow for creep, but I haven't heard of a single boat using it for standing rigging.

So I guess I'll be the guinea pig. I'll report on it in my blog.
I'm afraid I may not be too inspirational to the DIY-er, since I have a lot of practice with complicated splices, and I'll be adding compliation by covering the whole of each shroud with Dyneema sleeve, but at least I'll have a sense of how it holds tune and behaves underway.

DM20 is essentially the same product as Dynice DUX, just a different company (DSM vs Hampidjan).

DUX is SK-75 that is heat set, which removes creep (non-elastic movement under tension) and adds a fair bit of strength. Stretch is still a factor at high proportions of working load 3%, hence the sizing for stretch, not strength, results in 5x strength of the 316 1x19 wire it replaces. Bigger diameter though (we went from 12mm wire to 18mm DUX).

DM20 is SK-78 that goes through some process to remove creep and reduce stretch below 1% at high proportions of breaking strength. Strength is somewhat lower than DUX (5mm breaking strength DUX 4.8 ton and DM20 2.45 ton; weight DUX 23g/m and DM20 13g/m). Due to lower stretch it can be sized smaller than DUX - in our case 15mm (though I’m not sure it’s commercially available in that size).

Dyneema sleave that you pull over a Dyneema stay is OK for UV protection but just about useless for chafe protection. Much better is to pay for a braided Dyneema cover to be applied to the finished stay that doesn’t move independently from the stay underneath.

Do report back on your experience.

Tortuga's Lie · 13-04-2023, 08:21

I just re-rigged last fall and was real tempted to go with synthetic, but I am kind of a tied and true type of guy and since my old rigging was probably original to the boat (now 25 y.o.) I figured why switch? I did go with a professional rigger and yes, I could have done it cheaper myself (I re-rigged my old boat myself) but time was an issue. The rigger said that the best quality wire is now coming our of South Korea, not the USA, which surprised me.
I'm not opposed to use synthetic, but I'll sit on the sidelines to see if the longevity matches stainless.

Benz · 13-04-2023, 17:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by fxykty

DM20 is essentially the same product as Dynice DUX, just a different company (DSM vs Hampidjan).

DUX is SK-75 that is heat set, which removes creep (non-elastic movement under tension) and adds a fair bit of strength. Stretch is still a factor at high proportions of working load 3%, hence the sizing for stretch, not strength, results in 5x strength of the 316 1x19 wire it replaces. Bigger diameter though (we went from 12mm wire to 18mm DUX).

DM20 is SK-78 that goes through some process to remove creep and reduce stretch below 1% at high proportions of breaking strength. Strength is somewhat lower than DUX (5mm breaking strength DUX 4.8 ton and DM20 2.45 ton; weight DUX 23g/m and DM20 13g/m). Due to lower stretch it can be sized smaller than DUX - in our case 15mm (though I’m not sure it’s commercially available in that size).

Dyneema sleave that you pull over a Dyneema stay is OK for UV protection but just about useless for chafe protection. Much better is to pay for a braided Dyneema cover to be applied to the finished stay that doesn’t move independently from the stay underneath.

Do report back on your experience.

Several things:

DM20 is NOT SK78 that's been heat-set. That is also available, and has different properties than DM20. The latter comes both plain and heat-set, and the advantage to it of heat-setting is remarkable, unless Marlow is publishing falsehoods in their engineering specs.

Hampidjan uses DSM dyneema fibers.

While the Dyneema sleeve is largely for sun protection (I'll paint it to last longer), is does protect against chafe, though I've set my boat up to largely not have chafe issues. Having shrouds overbraided after splicing would be prohibitively expensive, and would negate the DIY aspect, which I enjoy.