Sheaves

[Bruce]

Does anyone know if the sheaves at the top of mast on a CD25 should move ei;roll free, or are they stationary? Mine seam to be either
stationary or frozen.Any help is greatly appreciated.
ThankYou
Bruce

[Bruce Lumsden]

Does anyone know if the sheaves at the top of mast on a CD25 should move ei;roll free, or are they stationary? Mine seam to be either
stationary or frozen.Any help is greatly appreciated.
ThankYou
Bruce

Bruce-

These sheaves should turn. Once you get them moving, you will find it much, much easier to hoist your sails. The only easy way to fix them is to get the mast horizontal and to dissassemble the masthead assembly. You should find that there are four sheaves, two port and two starboard, for the jib halliard and main halliard, respectively.

The sheaves themselves are made of aluminum and you may find that you have worn them out-of-round by dragging the wire part over one sector of each sheave for however long they have been frozen- if this is the case, you should replace them. You should be able to find replacements from Rig-Rite who assembled the whole rig in the first place or from other large rigging suppliers like Schaefer. If you are not well-versed in this sort of thing, your local sail loft/rigging establishment should be able to help you out.

If the sheaves are not too badly worn, you should be able to remove the stainless 1/4" bolts that serve as axles and pull the sheaves out of the aluminum masthead casting, soak them in penetrating oil, and separate out the brass bushings that serve as bearings for each of the sheaves. Once you have cleaned and shined up the parts, you should be able to reassemble using new bolts for axles, carefully greasing everything, and rerigging the mast- then you will be on your way with a lot less effort in raising sails and will a lot less wear on the wire part of your halliards.

You should also check these wires for excessive wear and replace if necessary- if you take the old wires to West Marine, you will find that you can get new wire of an appropriate size and that you can use their swaging tool to make new wires/eyes of the appropriate length/size. I hope this is helpful.

Bruce Lumsden
CD 25 Sabine
Hull 314
Harpswell, Maine



JLumsden@gwi.net