janders;
That should be a safe way to do this, you should also be confident that your mast equipment is of good standard. No use taking your precations if the halyard or blocks are in a bad state. It is safer to use a halyard led inside the mast if possible.
SteveInMD;
The only problem with using the
windlass in the bow is that you would either need to have two crew on deck to handle both halyards (as you will like the slack on the safety
line to be taken in on your way up - similar ting when going down)
I use my genoa
winch for lifting the bosuns chair, to do this i'm using to snatch blocks to get the halyard led to the
winch. One on the mast at about goosneck hight, the other one attached to the rail to get a good lead to the winch. The safty
line goes to the halyard winch.
I also have comment to the use of snapschacles for the bosuns chair..
A friend of mine who is quite new to sailing told me about an incident he had this summer.
The main Halyard was gone to the top of the mast, he has a fractional rigged boat - so the only available halyard available to go to the top was the
spinnaker halyard. He clipped the halyard on to the bosuns chair an had his girlfriend hoist him with the electric primary winch.
He got to the top and retrieved the hallyard (he only pulled the rope out of the mast so the
shackle was hanging a bit above the upper spreader.
On the way down the snapshackle released and suddenly he was sitting on the upper spreaders. He was lucky as he only glided along the mast a couple of meters before his stopped.
He was able to tie on to the newly retrieved main hallyard and instruct his GF to put the main halyard on the winch to lift him up so he could retrieve the
spinnaker halyard.
Lessons learnt:
-Put in a rope in the topping lift sheave that can double as a reserve main halyard and safety line when using the bosuns chair.
-Never trust the snapscackle when using a bosuns char
-Use a safety rope, the genoa halyard would be better than nothing even if its not going to the top.
Knut
Actually, first off make sure your bosun chair isn't one of the ones that has been recalled by Taylor made. If you want to help "pull" yourself up the mast with your hands, use another halyard to pull up a thicker strand of 3-strand and pretend you are in gym class again. You can also use three Prusik Knots and climb the halyard itself. Put the bosun's chair tied onto one, and then tie two more, one for each foot. Climb up the halyard by alternating pressure on each knot and moving the loose one up the halyard.
