Internal Halyard Dampening Device

[JohnYates]

My 1981 Bristol has several interesting devices on the mast that I believe are halyard dampening devices. On the outside of the mast are round, chrome discs attached by 2 small screws. When I attempted to remove one of them, it became apparent that a rod extended internally and felt kind of rubbery in a rubber band sense of rubbery. At that point, I became afraid that I might break it or cause it to become unattached and promptly re-attached it. Before I mess with it again, I'd love to see an image of the device. Can anyone provide? I need to remove them in order to refinish/repaint the mast. Thanks for your comments and assistance.

[JohnYates]

Turns out that I was able to contact the (French) guy who actually designed the original Hood in-mast furling masts. He said that the devices were indeed dampening devices especially useful since the spreaders are held in place with a through the mast "bolt" that could chafe away at halyards. They only used them on earlier models as Hood changed the design of the spreaders, making the need for the dampening devices much less important.