Lost Radar Cable Inside Mast

[Hudson Force]

I've had great success using the vacuum method with a small cotton ball and dental floss. I'm always amazed at the length of dental floss packed inot the little case!

[capngeo]

Not a mast, but I just used a vacuum to pull a string through 200' of buried conduit

If the mast is vertical go from the top down, it horizontal either direction the vacuum should work.... If it doesn't and the mast is horizontal, the fish tape will work if you can navigate the opening.

[Roy M]

You can consider this a blessing in disguise. It's not that expensive ($500 in San Diego) to pull and reset a mast. Once it's on the hard you can yank to your heart's content and replace whatever got broken. You can also check all the fasteners, fittings, sheaves, nav lights (and others), touch up damaged paint, etc. You can even add a separate conduit for the new radar cable, or repair the one you broke, it's not rocket science. Think of it as doing deferred maintenance.

[DeepFrz]

Posted by Dockhead in a different thread today:

Now that I have received my WSO-100 Maretron wind instrument, I've got to figure out how to install it. I am conscious of time ticking before the mast goes back in so I can't really screw around with it endlessly.

[hellosailor]

If the stick is out and horizontal(ish) that's another vote for the fish tape, should be all of ten bucks for one. Twenty for 100' in a small reel.

[Dockhead]

I bought something called a "cable access kit", at the local ironmongerer's. It consists of a number of thin fiberglass rods which screw together, with a little hook at the end. It's brilliant. Unfortunately the kit I bought turned out to have only five rods, or five meters. It went right up that conduit without a hitch, but it's not long enough. So I'm waiting with bated breath for a full kit to arrive on Monday, with 10 one-meter rods. I'm thinking it will work (where is that smiley with the crossed fingers?).

[hellosailor]

Dockhead, with equipment like that, instead of a simple fish tape, you're likely to get five stars from Michelin. Of course if you really wanted that fifth star, you'd probably have to get the access kit with a video camera for the probe, too.<G>

[Dockhead]

Here's how it all turned out. Hope my experiences help someone.

The "cable access kit" is brilliant. Never seen anything like that before. Got it from the wonderful ironmongerers in Cowes, Hurst. One of those magical shops with every odd bit of everything crammed to the eaves. Where they never heard about stock turnover and other modern retailing concepts.

So I poked it through and without any great difficulty got a mouse line in. So far so good.

Then tried to pull the cable through from the bottom, but it kept getting hung up on something, although I had taped it up to make as smooth a profile as possible. So we tried pulling it the other direction, and it popped right through! Et voila! I pulled an extra mouse line through to help me pull cables for the stuff which will go on the lower spreader (horn, various antennae, spreader lights, cameras).

I got far less accomplished this trip than I planned (isn't it always the way) but at least I've got the new radar installed on the mast with cable in place. Next time I will have to get all the other bits and bobs with their associated cables on the mast, and most importantly, get the ultrasonic wind instrument installed somehow at the masthead.

A happy ending.

[nigel1]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

I got far less accomplished this trip than I planned (isn't it always the way) but at least I've got the new radar installed on the mast with cable in place. Next time I will have to get all the other bits and bobs with their associated cables on the mast, and most importantly, get the ultrasonic wind instrument installed somehow at the masthead.

A happy ending.

Out of interest, what make of wind amnometer are you fitting.'
Have 3 on the work boat made by Gill. Two problems we found, seagulls seem to like pecking out the sensor, and unless they units are heated, they stop working in snow (although your unlikely to be out in the snow)

Glad the cable access kit worked, picked mine up from Aldi when they had one of their specials running, £5 for a 10m set.

[Phillip]

I had the same problem with a Selden mast. The mast had been spliced in the middle and the screws were protruding into the conduit area. The mast was up and had a rigger aloft who dropped a bicycle chain with a string attached to get to the bottom. The cable connector still snagged in the joined area, but the rigger finally got it thru, by reversing the pull from top down to bottom up. Took several hours for 2 men.