I believe the general consensus on replacing the standing rigging on a sailboat is around 10 years. We’re not quite positive as to when ours was done last, but we do know it’s been over 10 years. We were told that the mast and boom were replaced in 2003. We kind of assume that’s when the standing rigging was replaced too, but we could be wrong. Ultimately it doesn’t really matter to us, because we always figured we’d have to replace the standing rigging no matter what boat we bought. In fact, I don’t think we looked at a single boat with brand new standing rigging when we were boat shopping. And most we saw were in desperate need of replacing.
SVRO’s rigging looked pretty good when we bought her in 2012. It’s been 5 years, and though we haven’t used the rig hard at all since then, we don’t want to have to think about it while in the middle of our trip. Or worse yet, have something fail and ruin the trip altogether.
As usual, you can check out our videos where we change these stays on our YouTube Channel, on our Videos page, or right here (scroll down).
Backstay
We started with the backstay because it was easier since we have a furler on the headstay. All the existing standing rigging is swaged, meaning the toggles and eyes at the ends are put on with a machine and done at a rigging shop. They cannot be inspected or repaired and Rich didn’t like that. So we decided use Hayn Hi-mod fittings at the bottom of each shroud (wire) and swaged fittings at the top. The Hayn Hi-mod fittings are reusable and inspectable. Our reasoning for putting them at the bottom is because that’s where we can easily inspect them. The swaged ends won’t rust or corrode as easily at the top of the mast and since the fitting points downward, salt and water won’t as easily get into the swage and cause corrosion.
Headstay
We have a Schaefer furler on our headstay. We changed the wire inside the furler same as the backstay, EXCEPT, we put the swage at the bottom. The furler requires a swaged fitting at the bottom. So we had to put the Hayn Hi-mod mechanical fitting is at the top of the mast.
