VHF cable stuck in the mast

[Boatyarddog]

Originally Posted by poiu

The boat was re-rigged and the antenna exchanged, but they forgot to clamp the cable. It dropped into its conduit and ripped the connector off in the process. It can now be seen with an endoscope 750mm down from the top. The conduit is about 32mm ID and the cable about 8mm OD.

I spent hours trying to fit a noose made from fishing line around it using a loop feeder made from a coat hangar. It works in the cockpit, but at height is hard. Plus the endoscope gets in the way and I can’t use it to help position things, so I’m working blind. It’s worse as the conduit is offset from its access hole, so little movement is available.

I can’t pull the cable out from the bottom as it goes round too many bends. It will be a while until the next mast pull.

Any ideas?

Fishing line, but have you tried a hook, small maybe weighted.
Drop it down and snag that coax, maybe a steel leader.
Sorry for your troubles.
SV Cloud Duster

[Brian.D]

You get a 6mm wooden dowel about 1m long. Drive a thin tack nail about 50mm in length through the top of the dowel so it comes out at an angle. Push the dowel down the channel, you should have enough room in that 32mm channel to get past the cable. Turn the dowel so the nail is pointing toward the cable. Pull hard to snag and get the b..ch out of the mast.

You can do this.

[poiu]

Thanks a lot for the ideas. Much appreciated. I’m going to try a few once I have bought the bits. I’m sure it can be done. I’d like to buy a better endoscope/screen too. Mine is almost unusable in bright daylight and going up at night is a little dangerous as the man on the winch can’t see to stop if you get snagged.

[colinalleck]

So sorry to hear of the problem if the personnel, who did this job are professional qualified technical experts they would have pride in their work and would have responded accordingly

Do you owe them any money for the service they provided?

If you have no other options respectfully request their approval to share your story and then name and shame so to be a warning for others.

As a cheap easy fix till next time fit a rail mount aerial or run a new vhf aerial external to the mast either option sucks

Col

[qwert]

If you can fit barbs to the three pronged wire grabber it wouldn't slip. Three straightened out cod hooks would do.

[svHyLyte]

In your shoes, I'd try tieing a small slip knot in a length of messenger line and, leaving a reasonable loop in the end, attach it to the end of your bore scope with a small piece of double stick tape. Slide the scope into the conduit with the loop hanging down. With a little dexterity, one might maneuver the loop over the cable end and then, patiently take up on the slack/running end of the line such that the loop tightens over the cable end. The more you haul on the running end, the tighter the loop becomes around the cable and, with this, and a little patience, you might be able to haul the cable up'n out of the conduit. (Or not!) Might work, however.


FWIW...

[poiu]

The rigger is completely disinterested. His policy is to employ contractors for electrical and radio work , presumably to avoid this kind of issue. I’m still disappointed he ignored the obvious. My boat maintenance guy is also a friend, so we won’t fall out over it. Out here you can’t get legal redress anyway, so whatever goes wrong it becomes your problem.

I’m making do with my emergency antenna, taped to the bimini. I’ll get someone up the mast to try these ideas in the next hurricane season.

[Intentional Drifter]

That's a tough situation, to be sure!


If you have access to the bottom of the conduit and you can free the conduit to move up and down, with enough slack in the VHF cable, then I suggest you first duct tape the VHF cable around the bottom end of the conduit so it will not move within the conduit. Then, raise the conduit, which you should be able to grab much easier. Once the conduit is high enough out of the top of the mast, use a pipe cutter to remove enough of the conduit to be able to grab the cable.


Once you have your cable secured, you can then run the cable back through the conduit and duct tape the two pieces of conduit back together, drop it back down the mast and you'll be good to go.


Otherwise, I think you'll be pulling the mast, or running an entirely new VHF cable back down the mast.


Good luck!


ID

[Jode7]

Pull the cable out, drop down a weighted strong string line and pull up a new cable.

[Montanan]

Very difficult situation that. Perhaps the endoscope could be attached to a stout clawed grabber tool, wherein the endoscope provides you with sight to guide the grabber tool.

There are many versions of grabber tools, most are flimsy. You likely will need one with adequate length and adequate grasping force to be able to pull up the 25 meters of coax cable. Also of issue is whether the cable is jammed and difficult to vertically raise.

Pushing up is like pushing on a string, but pulling on a smooth cylinder is also difficult because the cable lacks anything to grasp and the protective insulative jacket is inherently hard and slippery. Fiddling about, up mast get's old, frustrating and unproductive fast.

Sorry to say it but you might be facing pulling the mast.

A preferred alternative would be to send down another length of cable as a replacement, but you likely will need to remove the broken ended one first so as to clear the conduit to allow a new cable to be inserted the full length. You can use a standard electrician's fish tape to aid in pulling the new cable line, get a professional grade of the electrician's tape, they are stiffer and of great length than your DIYer grade. If you have extra length of coax on your broken cable you might be able to reutilize it and not need to purchase new cabling. Never a fun task, but less of a PITA and less expensive than stepping a mast.

Or you could just install an antenna much lower than the top of the mast until the next time you step the mast; you would only be giving up some distance of communication capability on the VHF, so not the end of the world. Few power boaters have antenna that are anywhere near as tall as sailboat masts, particularly your rather tall mast. Less chatter received from the radio can be a welcome thing, as I find such the most annoying thing on a boat, almost as bad as waking up to hear a commuter traffic report on your radio alarm clock. Distant chatter being of less value and greater annoyance. The next worst bit of troublesome electronics being the wind gauge, wherein a passenger will keep reading out loud the velocity of each gust, until I turn the damn thing off and state: "Yes, it is breezy." I have never needed to know the exact speed of the wind to sail a boat, nor a read out of its APA. A broken windex being a WGAD. Not like it will change the conditions or direction. Just Sail!

[Montanan]

Originally Posted by poiu

Is this what you meant? I found other types that didn’t look of potential. This might work so long as the grip is strong. It’s a hard plastic coating on the cable.

https://www.amazon.com/X-Long-Flex-C.../dp/B0793JWN3H

The spring clawed grabber tools are handy for some tasks and might work in this instance. But of limiting factor will be the grasping strength of the claws on a cable as they tend to just slide off the slipper insulative jacket and your 25 meter length of cabling will be a rather heavy load as to gravity and greater if the cable is hung up on something and needs to be tugged to pull upwards and out of the mast. If your lucky you will only need to pull the upper portion of slack of the cabling and not the entire length.

Preparatory note: If you are successful in raising the cable and getting it's end out of the mast be sure to have a secure clamping tool available to bind it from redropping back into the mast. A vice grip plier can be clamped to keep the cable from returning when you let it go.

Per the specifications of the exemplary claw tool:

Extra-long pick-up range for retrieving dropped or hidden small parts & other items
36" length 50% longer than regular pick-up claws - like having 3 foot-long finger!
Wound-steel cable flexes to bend around corners and obstacles
Spring-loaded plunger extends & auto-retracts carbon steel claw to lift up to 1 lb

Good luck.

[Jimmyhenry]

If you can get access to the other end of the conduit could you get a compressed air hose on it. Compressor or dive tank. And blow the wire up the conduit out the top??

[Copacabana]

I faced a similar problem running a new cable in the mast. It got stuck. Here's what I did and my 2 cents...

If you can't pull the cable out from the mast base (you mention it's stuck and won't go up or down), I suspect the cables in the mast are crossed. I'd pull all the cables out together from the bottom of the mast (with a messenger line attached), sort them out, bundle them neatly, grease with dish soap and pull the lot up the mast together. If you have wires for LED lights in the mast, you can probably go to thinner wires, which might help with the space in the wire conduit. I know it sounds like a lot of work, but you'll have all your wires in order.

[mstr_cmdr]

Originally Posted by poiu

The rigger is completely disinterested. His policy is to employ contractors for electrical and radio work , presumably to avoid this kind of issue. I’m still disappointed he ignored the obvious. My boat maintenance guy is also a friend, so we won’t fall out over it. Out here you can’t get legal redress anyway, so whatever goes wrong it becomes your problem.

I’m making do with my emergency antenna, taped to the bimini. I’ll get someone up the mast to try these ideas in the next hurricane season.

Sounds like this rigger needs to be "named and shamed".

May I suggest that once you remove the VHF cable (probably RG-78 A/U - 12mm dia), remove all the cables from the conduit, which should have both the RF and electrical cables for the mast head anchor and tricolour (if fitted); and, the steaming/deck light assembly, replace:
a. the RF cable with "low loss" VHF cable (Hyperflex 5 - 50 ohm/5.4mm dia).
b. (assuming your mast lights are all LED) - replace the mast head light assembly with irrigation valve hook-up cable. It is three-core (red, white and black - use red for tricolour (or flashing light); white for anchor light; and, black for 0v). Use another run of cable for steaming/deck lights (white for steaming; red for deck; and black for 0v).
From memory, the total diameter of the cables is approximately 18mm, which should give you enough space in your 32mm conduit to run a DTV signal cable.

Oh, and don't forget to terminate all at the base of the mast for ease of stepping the mast.

Best of luck with the removal of the stuck RF cable.

[AndyEss]

Originally Posted by Brian.D

You get a 6mm wooden dowel about 1m long. Drive a thin tack nail about 50mm in length through the top of the dowel so it comes out at an angle. Push the dowel down the channel, you should have enough room in that 32mm channel to get past the cable. Turn the dowel so the nail is pointing toward the cable. Pull hard to snag and get the b..ch out of the mast.

You can do this.

I think this is the best suggestion of the lot.
Just be prepared to be very patient- and have a vice grip (as suggested by another poster) to grab and fix the coax if and when you raise it.
You do need someone at the mast base to feed and encourage the coax to go back up.
Once you have the coax pinned and ready to lift, getting some thinned dishwasing soap down the conduit will probably help slide it back up.
Good luck - I'm glad I don't have your problem, I just replaced my wind transducer and vhf coax on my boat with not too many problems and the assistance of a good new friend.