# What to do if a shroud or stay breaks



## northoceanbeach (Mar 23, 2008)

I was reading a book on cruising and it got me thinking. I need to know what to do if a shroud breaks. I should be able to do it without even thinking. The book says:

'the mast of a cruising boat should be of sufficient diameter and wall thickness, and the rigging of adequate strength, that even if one part of the rigging should give way, the mast will not break or sustain a permanent bend, if corrective action is taken immediately.'

So I guess I need to know what corrective action to take. Is it dependent on which part breaks? Or do you pretty much round up into the wind to depower the sails. That's the first action that comes to the top of my head, but there might be better ideas, and I would like to hear them.


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## SlowButSteady (Feb 17, 2010)

It all depends on which wire fails. If the forestay breaks on a boat with no inner stay you may not have time to do anything before the mast comes down. If a lower shroud (or even an upper shroud) breaks you might have time to tack or jibe to put that shroud on the lee side. In heavy winds any wire breaking could bring down the mast faster than you can do anything about it. In light winds you would probably have a better chance; but that isn't when things are likely to break, now is it?

Face it, modern Bermuda-rigged boats just don't have a lot of redundancy built into them.


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## BayWindRider (Jan 27, 2010)

I've seen a couple of cruisers carry rigging cutters just in case the mast comes down. You can probably get away with a hack saw as well. I'm sure during a confused or rough sea state you wouldn't want to have an unsecured mast bouncing around on or near the boat. That would be catastrophic in my mind. In that case the saw or the cutter would be used to send the mast to the bottom. I'll be damned if I'd be fooling with some clevis pin to detach a stay from the chainplate. Just cut the sucker...


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## PCP (Dec 1, 2004)

Try to replace its function with the help of halyards, if you have enough fuel return port under engine, if not sail slowly with deeply reefed sails.

I have saw many getting away with these measures, specially the last one in solo races. I even saw a guy continue to race (more slowly) under these circumstances and finishing the Transat.


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## denverd0n (Jun 20, 2008)

The idea is that you want to change your point of sail to relieve the pressure from the broken rigging. So, if you're on a starboard tack and the starboard shroud breaks, as quickly as possible you go to a port tack. If you're running downwind and the backstay lets go then you head up into the wind as quickly as possible. On any particular point of sail there will be some part of the rigging that is taking the majority of the strain, and some part that is more or less loose. Shift the point of sail so that the broken stay is one of the loose ones.

Of course, like SlowButSteady said, there's a good chance the mast is going to come down anyway.


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

As said above change point of sail to unload broken stay. If you have running backstays reef so sail below point of attachment and deploy. If you have spare halyards use to replace function of broken stay. If halyard external attach one end to chain plate. Attach block as close to possible to chain plate. Then run other end through block and tension with winch. ( may need to secure additional line to tail of halyard to effect. Can also use topping lift if no halyards available. If stay with roller furling on it secure rolling furling gear to bow pulpit or toe rail asap and drop sail if possible.


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## Faster (Sep 13, 2005)

We've had two rigging failures over the last 30+ years... one where a spreader root failed, effectively negating the support of an upper shroud (single spreader rig) in about 15-18 knots of breeze. That time the mast folded over neat as you please at the spreader point before we knew what had happened. Fortunately the mast wasn't tall enough to do damage to the deck and we were able to sail home downwind from there.

The second was a lower diagonal rod on a 2 spreader rig, it snapped with bang and the mast had an immediate S in it. Luckily we were able to crash tack (essentially hove to) to get the strain off. We dropped the main, sent someone up to tie a line around the mast at the lower spreader and winched it up to relieve the S and motored home.. in both cases we were on a daysail not far from home.


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## smurphny (Feb 20, 2009)

You might consider building in some redundancy. I just installed an inner forestay with running backstays that serve as a lower, independent triangular structure. Aside from that, PCP's reply about using spare halyards is the usual first response to a broken shroud or stay. After that, you can always make a quick repair by making an eye with a small compression tool. Having some spare Dyneema onboard is a good idea in order to use lashing to secure stuff. If a mast comes down, it may want to put a hole in the boat but I would think hard before just cutting it free. If you can get it secured, you can use it to jury-rig something to get you home. Carrying spare wire, turnbuckles, swageless ends, a come-along, copper compression sleeves, and sail mending materials may get you home avoiding the need to call for help.


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## jppp (Jul 13, 2008)

Should I assume deck stepped vs keel stepped would make a difference as to when a mast would fail?


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## paradiselostparrot (Apr 16, 2013)

Only so far as the lower end of the mast is more secure and less bending moment as being held at the base and the deck.Above the spreaders would see no difference. In a rollover type dismasting you are more likely to be left with a stub with keel step.A forestay or backstay failure under load I doubt there will be much difference to the damage except again u might see more of a stub.


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## SlowButSteady (Feb 17, 2010)

jppp said:


> Should I assume deck stepped vs keel stepped would make a difference as to when a mast would fail?


Some difference, but probably not much. The moment arm is just too long for the mast to be supported by the deck. More than likely it would just snap at the partners, and possibly making a big hole in the deck as it does.


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## Omatako (Sep 14, 2003)

I had a lower inner stay snap on a 36 foot boat during an Indian Ocean passage.

I used quite a heavy duty 4-1 block system (14mm line) and with a loop in the remains of the stay, I tensioned it up with a winch and I thought "Well done, that'll get me to the next port" (which incidentally was at least four days away). The sea state was quite boisterous and the SE trades were doing their normal 15 to 20 knots

During the night I started shipping large volumes of water into the boat past the mast partners and when I went up on deck I discovered that the one pulley in the block system had been totally destroyed by the tension and the mast was gyrating in the deck aperture.

Long story short, everything else I tried failed. Eventually the rubber packing in the mast partners came completely out and I had to winch the mast forward 3 inches until it was wedged firm in the front of the hole in the deck (used the anchor winch to do this). I cut up some old weather gear and made a sock around the mast and deck partners that stopped the boat from sinking.

This worked better than anything else and I eventually made a safe haven where I got the problem fixed.

But following this experience I have a profound respect for people who say that they use bits of rope, halyards and stuff to support their mast and carried on sailing. My problem was an inner stay, not even a main shroud. They obviously have talents/skills that waaaayyy exceed mine.


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## outbound (Dec 3, 2012)

amazing story. ?what kind of boat where you on? ?What was the shroud design? Never experienced anything close- good on you for getting through it. I would not have thought the mast would work to that degree. What sail did you have up and on what point of sail to have the mast pumping like that? Thanks you just gave me something else to worry about tonight


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## travlin-easy (Dec 24, 2010)

I had a forestay part right at the top of the deck turnbuckle. This occurred just a few seconds after the jib was furled on my 27 Catalina. The wind was woofing at about 20 at the time, and we were in a running mode with fairly heavy, following seas. The entire roller furling system fell into Chesapeake Bay, almost in slow motion and the only thing that saved it from sinking to the murky depths were the jib sheets, which had just been cleated off. The mast was saved from damage by quickly attaching the old jib halyard to a bow cleat, then winching the halyard tight with the jib winch. The main had already been lowered prior to the forestay failure.

The boat was motored 20 miles back to Perryville, MD at the head of the bay, and the following day it was motored across the bay to Tidewater Yacht Basin at Havre de Grace where repairs were quickly made. Despite some nasty bends in the aluminum sheaves of the Alado Roller Furling System, I was able to straighten them using a rubber mallet and a couple blocks of wood. Only a single sheave was damaged beyond repair, which I found amazing.

Good topic,

Gary


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## smurphny (Feb 20, 2009)

Omatako, what kind of blocks failed? Was it a vang ? It would be interesting to hear what NOT to use in this situation. I keep a regular come-along on board which I'd probably try to use to quickly tension a broken stay. Another option is to keep some cheap 1/2" galvanized turnbuckles aboard just for emergencies like this. Another option: some locust deadeyes which could quickly be rigged into a 4:1 purchase. I've been looking for some pieces of locust to make a few deadeyes, an old but effective means of applying tension to rigging.http://i40.photobucket.com/albums/e239/Prestoboat/deadeyes.jpg


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## killarney_sailor (May 4, 2006)

Just after we left Durban harbour last year we had a failure of the double tangs that attach our starboard lowers to the mast. This meant that both lowers clattered to the deck. Winds were 20-25 knots. Seas were not high, maybe 4-5 feet but quite confused. We immediately tacked which meant we were (sort of) hove-to). I have running backstays (Dyneema) that go only a few feet higher than the lowers. I ran one of these through a honking big snatch block through the top of the chain plate which is a loop and then took the line back to one of the cockpit winches and proceeded back to the harbour which was only a few miles. I asked port control for immediate entry to the harbour but she did not seem to understand what had happened and wanted me to wait for a large container ship to enter which would have meant killing about 20 minutes in conditions that were getting nastier in the shallow water near the harbour entrance. Talked to the pilot on the ship who had been listening to the radio and he instructed me to cut directly across the channel (we weren't close) and stay to the side of the channel on the way in. He caught up at the end of the channel and we all lived happily ever after.

Lessons:
- Guys who bring massive ships into busy harbours are pros
- It is great to have a massive mast section and we do especially with the internal main furling. With two shrouds down in bumpy conditions before we tacked, the mast was remarkably stable. Don't have the dimensions but when I was thinking to use Spartite, by my calculation two large kits might have been enough. I look at the mast sections of more modern boats and I am sure they are engineered to be strong enough when all the supports are there but if something breaks you wonder. This seems especially true for complex, rigs with multiple spreaders. Hood went with a single spreader system on the Bristol 45.5. The rig is just over 60' above the water. Seems sort of old fashioned, but strong.
- Think through contingencies before they happen. When you are cruising you have lots of time to say to yourself, what would I do if ... happened right now. I had thought about losing a shroud, even though the rigging was new in 2010, so there was not much hesitation in getting into action.

I don't want to give the impression that this sort of thing is routine and ho-hum. It is one of those where is the spare underwear moments, but they happen and you deal with them. BTW, I had done a full visual inspection of the rig after crossing the Indian Ocean and this happened only a month or so and 100 miles later. Maybe I need better eyes. Probably should have sent June up as she is more detail-focussed than I am.


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## chucklesR (Sep 17, 2007)

These stories of stay's breaking really lend credence to the idea that an extra halyard of sufficient strength (say Dyneema or Amsteel) is a very very good idea, especially for cruisers.
I'd planned on it loosely, that's firming up to a requirement now.


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