Pin rails for satety

[Steve Laume]

This is something I would encourage for anyone who is concerned about staying on board while working at the mast. I didn't so much want pin rails as a butt rest. This could be as simple as a piece of line, well secured between your lower shrouds. A wide piece of strap would improve comfort and could have grommets or a webbing loop that could be tied in place. The pin rails serve the purpose very and also add a rather salty look to your boat.

The point is to set the height so it supports your butt when the boat is heeled and your are standing on the cabin top at the mast. If you have a tight tether secured to the mast and your butt against the pin rail it makes for a very secure work place, Steve.

[Jim Cornwell]

How have you used the belaying pins, besides enforcing order among the swabs, that is?

[Steve Laume]

Not too much. I really did want the rail for safety reasons.

I thought I might use them to secure my halyards off of the mast but they are still a bit too pretty to risk chafing them up. I did use them a few times for the halyards but I already have a pretty good system for them. I do have a line rigged for a boom preventer that runs from a bail at the end of the boom to the forward end. I rig a small block and tackle from the stanchion base near the shrouds that clips to a loop on the end of the boom line. The pin rails work very nicely for keeping the tackle handy and out to the way.

The stainless steel pins with good handles could also serve as fish billies but it you had an unruly fish in the cockpit, you might not want to leave it there while running to the pin rail to retrieve you club.

Mostly, they just look right and work out very well for support at the mast, Steve.

[John Martin]

Hi Steve,

Did you make the belaying pins? If so, how? Did you buy them? If so, where? How much? I have a need for about 12 of them aboard Carina.

John

[bottomscraper]

You can get bronze belaying pins in 3 sizes from Hamilton Marine:

http://store.hamiltonmarine.com/browse. ... 26866.html
http://store.hamiltonmarine.com/browse. ... 27539.html
http://store.hamiltonmarine.com/browse. ... 26876.html

And Ash, Brass and Bronze here:
http://www.greenboatstuff.com/

Make your own wood and stainless here:

http://www.instructables.com/id/Create- ... ying-Pins/

[Steve Laume]

Hi Steve,

Did you make the belaying pins? If so, how? Did you buy them? If so, where? How much? I have a need for about 12 of them aboard Carina.

John

John, I did make my belaying pins.

When they were building the Amistad at Mystic Seaport I was involved with a wood turning club that was contacted to turn all the pins. As a result I have three belaying pins with my initials on the ends aboard the Amistad.


As a thank you for our work, we were given a private guided tour of the ship building facilities. We were also turned lose on a couple of pallets of scarp wood left over from the project. So I had the patterns for the pins and some nice Angelique that was shipped from Africa for the Amistad. The pins on the Amistad are all wood and a bit large for a Cape Dory so I reduced them and went with 1/2" stainless round rod for the pins. I wanted to use bronze but the cost was pretty high to go that route.

Making the pins was fairly easy if a bit time consuming. I first cut the stainless to 12" lengths and rounded one end. I then cut blanks and drilled a slightly over sized hole in the end for the pins. To be sure they stayed in there I ground a bunch of spirals in the pins and epoxied them into the blanks. The spirals also help to let the air out when you are pushing the pins into the epoxy. It was then just a matter of chucking the pins in the lathe and turning the handles. The hardest part is getting them all the same but you make a few depth cuts and then eye ball the rest. You get much faster and and better at it as you progress. The Angelique turns very nicely as it is hard and greasy much like teak.

I really like the idea of having different woods on the boat that have some connection with other people, places or events. Overall it was a fun and rewarding project, Steve.

[rtbates]

This is something I would encourage for anyone who is concerned about staying on board while working at the mast. I didn't so much want pin rails as a butt rest. This could be as simple as a piece of line, well secured between your lower shrouds. A wide piece of strap would improve comfort and could have grommets or a webbing loop that could be tied in place. The pin rails serve the purpose very and also add a rather salty look to your boat.

The point is to set the height so it supports your butt when the boat is heeled and your are standing on the cabin top at the mast. If you have a tight tether secured to the mast and your butt against the pin rail it makes for a very secure work place, Steve.

very nice Steve.. Another project to keep my retirement days fruitful! THANKS...

[Skeep]

Well I must say, they do add a salty look Steve. Have you added baggy wrinkles yet? In keeping with the tradition of those salty ships of yore, I added them to La Belle Vie as she is in transition to her new name, Baggy Wrinkles:

[fenixrises]

Hi all,

Love my "Ass Planks". Not fancy but they work very well.

On FeNIX it's just a simple plank.


On Sunshine I added wooden dowel pins. Simple and cheap.


Take care,
Fred

[Astronomertoo]

Great idea--good to see others using them.
We did something similar on a previous boat, with a piece of varnished 2-1/2" square mohogany, ripped at an angle so when grooved and thu bolted (clamped) tightly to the 3 stays the top and bottom was level. We used an electrical bronze split clamp at the top and bottom of each standing rigging stay, which did no harm the SS wires. We used them to stand on, sit on, dive off of, and generally lean on underway. They could allow you to stand higher than on the boat which could be handy if looking for something on the horizon.
Best wishes,
BobC

[Ron M.]

I turned some and installed them on the shrouds a couple of years ago. I think I located them 42" off the deck, can't remember, but it seemed like a logical and useful hight
Big drawback was the jib sheets, at times, would get hung up on the pins.
How high off the deck are yours ?

[tjr818]

This has been one of my winter projects. I have two different variations of belaying pins made, one is solid Lignum Vitae the other is a Lignum Vitae handle with 1/2" brass rod or anodized aluminum (can't decide). My question is how to fasten the pin rail to the shrouds. What method did you use?

[Jim Cornwell]

Pin rails are still on my winter project list too and the matter of attachment to the shrouds is the most problematic detail. Lashing is one traditional method; clamping a split rail with through bolts is another. Both require preparing the shroud with serving to prevent the whole shebang from slipping on the slick stainless wire, especially when subject to force from from a tensioned halyard. For those of you who have completed pin rails and posted photos of them, how did you meet this challenge? Jim.

[tjr818]

Jim,
I know that serving the shrouds is recommended by Bruce Bingham, Brion Toss, and a few others, but I wonder if that might lead to crevice corrosion of the stainless steel shrouds due to the shrouds being deprived of oxygen.

[Jim Cornwell]

I've wondered about anaerobic corrosion too with serving - but you see it all the time!