I saw those from Murrays but since they are stainless you still have stainless in direct contact with the aluminum. Granted you get the water tight seal but you get those with the closed rivets as well, and it they are less hassle than the two pieces and having to drill the holes out bigger. Cost is close to the same though. I have heard the monel over stainless arguement and while I can see the advantage in a large boat where the rig stays up all the time I have never had a corrosion problem on my beachcats, probably because the mast gets washed after use.

The Top Hat insulator I used was alluminum. I assembled a few boats for Hobie and was instructed by the guy who tought me (Hobie Dealer) to use them on all the mast rivets.

Just passing along some of the Dealer "Tips".

Lee Wicklund/ Nacra 20

Yeah, that was the arguement against. Makes sense to me. And I wanna do what you T boys do! Thanks for the help.

dave

Couldn't quite think this through while typing me repsonse yesterday...but now after mulling it a while, I can see no way to make the block above the bail setup work. If you pass both sides of the halyard under the bail to get to the block, then the sail head cannot be hauled all the way to the block...it will jam up at the bail. If you leave the tail end of the halyard out side the bail, the sail will haul all the way to the block...but then it's just like not having the bail there at all, as the block can swing side to side from the strop with the only limit to how far it swings being the length of the strop line.

This does raise the question: is there an ideal amout of swing for the halyard block?

Mike.

I guess I thought the blk was above the bail because that's the way the HT is set up stock. It's got an undersized cheek blk riveted to the mast above the bail. I guess the bail is placed so that when fully hoisted, the spin head stops just shy of the bail, the remainder of the hlyd goes under the bail, thru the blk, and the tail also goes under the bail on it's way down the mast. So it's now the hlyd sliding from side to side under the bail instead of the strop. Seems like either would work, although you guys have longterm experience on your side.

Dave