Hyoung wrote:
MChristo: When stepping the mast, I leave slack in the port side stay which makes it easy to pin the forestay. Then I have the lovely and talented crew come over to the port side and pull down on the hiking wire while I take up the slack in the port shroud adjuster. This gets the rig pretty tight and its easier than trying to tighten at the forestay while you are holding up the furler and bridle.
As noted above in this thread, checking the standing rigging very carefully at the start of the season is a good way to go. Look for corrosion and stray/broken pieces of shroud at each end where they exit the compression swags. Because I sail in salt water, I change the standing rigging a bit more often.
So it sounds like I want to get the rigging fairly tight. I have not had it tight. Luckily I’m on a smallish lake with very limited chop. I”ll tighten it up the way you describe which definitely sounds better than the way I’ve been doing it at the forestay.
Thank you!