Last week my MarineBeam combo Steaming/Foredeck light lost its "wings" and was hanging on by the wires alone. Last year, the foredeck light was blowing fuses, and I had troubleshot this issue to either the fixture or the mast wiring, so I had disconnected the wiring for the foredeck light at the base of the mast. I'm not real happy that this expensive light fixture quit after 9 years, but that's a subject for another thread.
How to get up there and fix the damn thing?...
Because I already had a West Marine Bosun's Chair (it came with the boat), I purchased an ATN Bosun Chair Conversion Kit and gave it a try. I used a 7/16" Polyester Core Over Cover halyard to go up the first time. I fastened the bottom to a lower shroud chainplate winched it tight, and tried to go up the mast. I also wore a good pair of sailing gloves and shoes with a hard sole.
The Polyester halyard was way too stretchy. Because it was so stretchy, I could only move the ascenders about 4 inches, and still be able to shift my weight (~200lbs) from the foot ascender to the bosun's chair ascender. It took me 15 minutes to go up 30 feet, and 45 minutes to get back down. On the way up and down I was constantly trying to stabilize myself and prevent swinging around the line. I was able to observe that the "wings" had indeed fallen off, and the stainless screws that held the wings to the mast were gone(?). For my second attempt I tied a 1/2" Polyester Core line to the same halyard and the upper shroud chainplate and again winched it tight. This was better, but it was still awful!
Now I am sore, and my wallet is $300 lighter, and I am STILL going to have to pay to pull the mast to fix the problem...
Here is why:
How to get up there and fix the damn thing?...
Because I already had a West Marine Bosun's Chair (it came with the boat), I purchased an ATN Bosun Chair Conversion Kit and gave it a try. I used a 7/16" Polyester Core Over Cover halyard to go up the first time. I fastened the bottom to a lower shroud chainplate winched it tight, and tried to go up the mast. I also wore a good pair of sailing gloves and shoes with a hard sole.
The Polyester halyard was way too stretchy. Because it was so stretchy, I could only move the ascenders about 4 inches, and still be able to shift my weight (~200lbs) from the foot ascender to the bosun's chair ascender. It took me 15 minutes to go up 30 feet, and 45 minutes to get back down. On the way up and down I was constantly trying to stabilize myself and prevent swinging around the line. I was able to observe that the "wings" had indeed fallen off, and the stainless screws that held the wings to the mast were gone(?). For my second attempt I tied a 1/2" Polyester Core line to the same halyard and the upper shroud chainplate and again winched it tight. This was better, but it was still awful!
Now I am sore, and my wallet is $300 lighter, and I am STILL going to have to pay to pull the mast to fix the problem...
Here is why:
- The ascenders can only be moved a SHORT distance and still enable you to unweight the other enough to release the ascender to move it. This is because of the stretch in the halyard.
- While up the mast, I could observe, and use ONE HAND to work, but my other hand was necessary to stabilize myself. There is no way that I could hold the new fixture in place while crimping and heat shrinking the butt splice connectors, let alone drive new screws through the "wings" of the fixture and into the holes in the mast.
- Another issue is that the Windex at the very top of the mast (47 feet) has been non-functional since 2022. It seems that a fat bird (or birds) perched on it, and broke the Windex that I installed new in 2019. I found two pieces of my Windex on either side of the boat before I launched in 2022.
