http://www.briontoss.com/education/archive/miscsept04.htm

Oh noes, splicing lines on a dinghy?

Is this a test?

Sure, bubba.

Tie a knot in a high modulus line, load it up and see what you get.

I'll bite. What's a high modulus line?

What's a modulus?

Can we do two tests at once?

"You're in a desert, walking along in the sand, when all of a sudden you look down... "

I do this stuff in the rigging shop all the time on "The Punisher" (visualize a 30 foot I-Beam, a couple of load cells, some 8mm BB chain and a 40,000lb hydraulic ram).

We test different splices, knots, and blocks and their effects under pressure.

Watching a bowline cut itself is interesting. Testing working load on a new block is even more fun.

Checking the integrity of a eyesplice on a 27,000lb rated piece of spectra usually clears the room....

high-modulus fibers - known as spectra, vectran, technora, etc.

Hey Mike,
I do load tests too... up to two million lbs force. We pull steel in half also. with some of the steel being HY... it always sounds like a bomb going off. Three inch diameter rebar too.

Doing load tests on ships too. Cranes and pad eyes... it is always interesting... because a test has two possibilities.... one of them is scary.

I for one will never go back to cable trapeze. I've had the same 1/8" spectra trap lines on my boat for 4 years now...still going strong.

Ha!

Mike Deepsees' punisher is bigger than yours!

Couldn't resist.

Thanks Tami,
I appreciate that kind of link, give us more occaisionally.

Dave

Tami,
Thanks- a good read.

Hi Phill,

Not that you're near that point ;-)

but we've had PRÉCOURT made shrouds on our Fboat for three years now. She doesn't stand rigged up, since she lives on her trailer.

But, that said... we just got our rig back from PRÉCOURT. We sent the shrouds to him for to check and replace if necessary. That because we'd noted some chafing on the lower ends near the deadeyes. Erik respliced them for us, saying that since there was enough to retuck, he would just tuck back most of the chafed bit and that the shrouds should last several more YEARS. When we got the boat the shrouds were already aboard, I have to assume for at least two years before us?

Frankly, I'm impressed with the durability. That said, we do take good care of the shrouds. When we rig down we are always VERY sure to thoroughly rinse the rigging in fresh water. Although I've never seen it documented, it seems to me that salt crystals in the fibres would chafe and cut, as they do in sails.

I've gone to PRÉCOURT rigging for my Square as well. Wow, it sure is nice to stow and deal with nice lightweight fibre rather than heavy 'have to stow it just so' wire (gotta avoid that stainless memory bending issue). I can't speak too much to how it's behaving on the Sq because I've been sailing the Fboat so much the Sq is rather bereft. Fibre shrouds have a bit more windage but I would imagine the weight aloft savings wins that battle.

Phill, if you've joined the Fboats yahoo list. One of the moderators is doing his own tests of UV degradation on textile rigging. Of course results take years ;-)

Now, I must say, after tooting the proverbial horn about fibre rigging... a couple of interesting notes:
1. Smyth is all wire-rigging on his F25C. I'm not sure why, but I do know he stores the boat mast up on a lifting rack behind his house. Which may well have something to do with his rig choice.
2.Scharl (GAMERA, arguably the second fastest F25C in the US) has moved from a textile canting rig back to all wire static rig. His crew Mark (Zaranski, or "Z") has recently posted at the Fboats list to elaborate why. It's a good read, I'll go search it up if you like.

To my knowledge, I don't think Smyth has ever canted his F25C, although I do believe the 31-1D that he was racing on (ROCKETEER) did cant, but then the 1D came stock with canting. IIRC.

If you could dig up the "Gamera" report on fiber rigging, that would be very interesting for others here as well.

Would love to hear all about your 18Square rigging as well. So many conflicting rumours and opinions on fiber rigging these days.

Okey dokey, you asked for it:

from 'gashmore' at the Toss discussion list:
"I have finally started some quantitative testing on a sample of 9mm Dynex Dux. I have not completed the creep test but the dynamic stretch figures are in. I am getting a page together on my web site with all the gory details but I thought I would report the preliminary results here.

The purpose of my examination is to get some numbers to compare to 1x19 wire. I tried to follow the Cordage Institute's procedures but as the sample had only 28" clear of undisturbed rope I used an electronic positioning sensor called an LVDT capable of detecting .00005" movement. By adjusting for the specific weight of the rope I had estimated from Strong Ropes figure of .00055 in/in/1000lb for 11mm that 9mm should have an elongation of .00084, about equivalent to 5/16" 1x19. The tested figure (average of 20 pulls after 50 cycles to 20% of MBL was slightly better at .00078 in/in/10000lb. I have to attribute this to the possibility that the fiber is slightly more in line with the load in the smaller diameters.

One major difference I found was the hysteresis or rate of recovery after the load is removed. 1x19 will recover 90% or more of the elongation immediately and the rest over just a few seconds. Relaxed from 5,000lb to 2,000lb Dux only recovers about 60% immediately and another 30% over the next half hour to 45 minutes. It took almost 12 hours to recover all the elongation. What I think this means is that you shouldn't try to tune a rig immediately after it has been loaded heavily. If you dial in the tension before the shroud has fully recovered it will be to tight a few hours later. Also I think it is possible that the leeward shrouds might seem slightly slack immediately after a tack. I will have to examine this more closely.

The other interesting fact is the almost complete lack of torsional deformation. 1x19 will try to rotate as the lay straightens but braid remains in line. I don't think I would do away with cotter pins in the turn buckle though. :-)

Creep test begins next week and will take a couple of months."

...continued, the creep test from 'gashmore'....
"Well, after almost 2 months at 2,000 lb load at 80F on my 9mm sample I have almost nothing to report. .01" difference in the 24" gauge length. I just boosted it to 4,000 lb and will keep it there for another month but so far this is about as exciting as watching paint dry.

A further note on the slow recovery. I have received a couple of emails asking if the line stretches more if it is loaded again before it recovers. The answer is no. Loading fully recovered line from 2000 lb to 5000 lb the stress/strain curve is basically a straight line. Overlaying the curve from loading an unrecovered line there is a little variation as the load first increases until the slack is taken up. From that point on both are essentially equal."

Mark Z on canting rigs, from the Fboats discussion:

"Canting became de rigeur for 31 1Ds.

We ran a doubled 3:1 (two lines pulled simultaneously) in Precourt
eyes that were pulled by a 4:1 that was run along the top of the float
(s) to behind the aft beam where the adjustable end turned to a
clutch mounted on the aft surface of the beam close to the inboard
end. I am pretty sure the final (ignoring the massive friction)
mechanical advantage was 12:1.

Ira's posted pics of Rut Row's system are roughly similar to what we
had.

To tack we would ease the rig down to leeward (awkward in every way)
and pull up the soon-to-be windward side. Then tack. We never
pulled the rig to weather while loaded.

Jib cars had to be moved aft (w/rig canted) to compensate for a) the
narrower slot and b) the "less raked" position of the stick while
canted.

The forestay stayed the same length, so canting the rig to either
side would move the hounds in an arc... the farther away from center,
the farther forward the hounds moved (taking the top of the mast even
farther forward). This change dramatically effected the helm, making
it quite neutral compared with the normal weather helm we have/had
with the rig centered.

We worked it hard for two years, and I can't say (sorry all you pun
averse) we ever found the canting system to be worth (in speed or
point or feel) the complexity it added to our little boat with 2 or 3
crew program. Don't get me wrong, the system and the penalty we bore
for it did not cause us to lose an event...it just never proved to be
something that would allow us to win something we couldn't have won
with a centered rig. We did lose on corrected time a race to two
other 25s in St. Joe in light air. We beat them across the line so
had we not had the penalty we would have won that race, but our
problems had to do with being on the wrong side of the beat, NOT our
speed.

We are now back to sailing with (gasp!) STAINLESS SHROUDS with
turnbuckles!!!! We trade weight for (less windage and)lack of creep,
the rig stays centered. And the float top is free from annoyingly
taut amsteel blue dental floss and harken double blocks. The extra 8
meters of line trying to tangle with the main/screacher/spinnaker
sheets is not missed either, nor is the weight (of the two clutches,
4 harken doubles *2 w/becket*, 4 precourt deadeyes, lots & lots of
line, fasteners, etc.).

Like it or not, 3 sec/mile is almost non-existent on a course of a
few miles. On a 300 mile course its a different story. None the
less, we did not suffer from the approximately 15 minute penalty we
carried for the Mac race in the two years we raced with the canting
system. Do I honestly think the canting system improved performance
over the entire course enough to cancel-out the rating penalty?

No.

Mark Z
crew on Gamera, 2000 to present"

Rolf,

Brion Toss is arguably one of the best riggers in the US. He has a pretty comprehensive website which includes a discussion list. Toss, as you can see from the article, thinks quite well of textile rigging. Have a look at the 'spartalk' discussions. The Cruising Forums also have a fair amount of discussion regarding textile rigging.

Dynex Dux is made by Hampidjan and they have data at the Hampidjan website http://www.hampidjan.com/

For my part, I believe what people describe as 'creep' is actually alignment of the textile fibres, which if the rigging is left up would be easier to account for than for instance in my case whereat I rig down after sailing.

So what's your conclusion? Textile or SS?

I replaced the braided wire end of my jib halyard with something blue (don't remember what it's called), because I got tired of the "meat hooks" in the wire. But, I use the jib so rarely I can't say one is better than the other, except for the hooks.

Yes.

Absolutely for running rigging. Every line on both my boats are some flavor of Amsteel. I don't know whether I'd use textile standing rigging if I were to leave the rig up in the weather or on an unguarded beach (butt factor, some bastard redneck would be sure to cut your line, 'hey y'all, watch this!'.)

Hi all,

I tested dyneema for the shrouds on my beachcat last season. The advantages are low price (dyneema vs. steel with swages), easy handling (can be spliced by myself, can be stored with small radius) and the theoretical adavantage of lower weight, if there is one.
The disadvantages are creep in case of dyneema (I had to retension the rigg every time, although I pretensioned the shrouds 10x during testing), bad balance between steel forstays and fibre shrouds (this is very specific to my boat with double forestays) and this bad feeling, that Tami describes.

The boat was all the time mast up on the beach, exposed to UV radiation and storms. I used covered (double braided dyneema). I switched back to steel, because I wanted to sail more and re-tension the shrouds less. The boat felt not different during sailing.
At the end there is no clear yes or no. In future there might be a fibre which costs less than steel (including swages) and will not creep. Then the decission will be clear.

Cheers,

Klaus

guten tag Klaus,

don't give up on textile rigging. You should try Dynex Dux for your rigging, here's a quoted (from Navtec) nutshell why:

"...If you Anneal (cook while stretching) Dyneema, you make DUX. The strength goes up by 30-40% (depending on line size) and the stretch and creep drop to almost nothing. The line still has the same great UV and abrasion resistance as Dyneema, but now you have as low stretch and high strength as PBO. The line is also lighter and it doesn't absorb water, as compared to Vectran. The other positive about DUX is that it is only slightly more expensive than Vectran or Dyneema, vs. PBO which is incredibly expensive.

The only downside to DUX is that it is quite stiff when new, and will take a few days of sailing to soften up.

Uses for DUX include: Halyards, sheets, afterguys, outhauls, strops, standing rigging and any other low stretch/high strength applications.

DUX really is the new "Super Rope.""

About PBO (Zylon), from the source TOYOBO corp:

http://www.tufftemp.com/Download/PBO_TDS.pdf