Lubricating the Roller Furler slot

[Ralph H]

After running into some difficulty raising my RF Yankee this spring, I searched the archives and found references to SailKote for track slides and luff tape. I sprayed my luff tape, but still had more resistance than I liked, so I made up a rig to clean and lubricate the RF track which had wintered over in the slip while the Yankee enjoyed a berth indoors!
Below are some pictures of the rig. I used about 2 feet of soft cotton folded over several times and a foot of cord the size of #6 luff cord.




This was fastened at both ends with more cord and attached to the RF halyard swivel along with a downhaul. For security, the downhaul was attached to the RF swivel directly as well.


I then flooded the slot with lubricant above the cotton plug and then raised and lowered it until the slot was clean and lubricated.


At this point, some SailKote on the Yankee's luff tape finished the prep and I reinstalled the Yankee for a new season on the lower Chesapeake!

Hope this is helpful to fellow CD'ers,
Ralph