Hey guys - I did some searches on the topic, but did not find anything that covered the finer points of this subject.

I've got the lengths for the 3 basic sections for my 2010 C2. Material choices for the retrieval and spinnaker side halyard sections are easy - 3mm Spectra, but still debating which cover to use in between (recognize that about 1m of core/cover overlap is needed to properly hold in the cleat.

I've little experience with the finer points of splicing so am a little-bit hesitant. Do most of you roll your own or is there a good source? Any recommendations?

Hi Jeff,

Are you saying you would like to use 3mm spectra for the the halyard an retrieval with a 1 meter section in the middle to have a cover for the cleat?

Hope that is not the case as the 3mm spectra would be way too slippery and hard on the crews hands. Unless you dislike your crew then that's ok

The way to go is to buy a 5 or 6mm rope with a dyneema core and pull the core towards one end leaving about 1.5 meters still on the cover. Use a fid to dig out the core about 450mm from the end of the cover. Push the cover through the core at the exit point to form your lock. Tapper the end of the cover over 300 mm section, basically cut one strand at 25mm intervals. Now bury the cover into the core. This will make a nice long bury and will never move.

If you have done it right the crew will have a hollow core rope to hoist the kite with and to use as the retrieval.

Recommend looking at Marlow or Liros ropes.

Do you need the length required?

edit: measured the one that came with the boat (ex factory boat) the cover is 14.2 meters, core 7.6 meters and an overlap of 1.1 meters. total length 14.2 +7.6 -1.1 = 20.7 meters.

effectively you need to buy 14.2m of your favorite dyneema cored rope.

Jeff,

The majority of our fleet uses 5MM FSE Racing Sheet with 3MM Dyneema tapered into both ends. Racing sheet is similar to the stock line on the C2 but actually a bit better.
Personally I am fine with it just on the end that hoists the spinnaker.
I also prefer using a no stretch and stronger 2.5mm dyneema in Marlow's D12 Max. It's a bit more expensive but worth it. If you don't use that I would suggest using a New England Ropes Dyneema. Marlow and NER have the best two PU coatings.
I've made a lot of halyards and sold them, I'd be happy to make you one, shoot me a PM on facebook or email me. I make them a bit longer than than the AHPC website and you can fine tune it to your set up, since everyone has a different set up. Only catch is if you have an under tramp halyard I won't be responsible if it tangles! I've never heard of any issues of Racing Sheet tangling except in these under tramp systems and I am dumbfounded by it.
-Todd

Todd,

I assume you are talking about the single line retrieval system on the Vipers and C2 when referring to the under tramp halyard? Pretty much every line seems to twist and be liable to tangle in those. Point is, I doubt it is the racing sheet, though that line is a little worse at untwisting itself than others.

Jeff,
Might suggest adding a cover over the racing sheet where the head banger cleat engages the line when the halyard is up. Both Tripp and I had to do this on our Infusions to ensure the cleat would hold under reaching conditions...the line stretches under load, narrows, and starts to slip. Other tip is to add a bolt to the head banger to keep the head banger from opening and allowing the cleat jaws to spread apart.

I stopped the twisting and tangling in my spin halyard by replacing the grommet hole in the tramp with an exit block, once there was no friction on the grommet there was no twist

Sam the under the tramp system is where you have 2 grommets in the tramp roughly in the middle fore/aft and about 2 feet apart. the halyard runs from the main beam, through the grommet then continues to the rear beam where the turning blocks are mounted on the underside of the tramp. the halyard then turns head to the retrieval side grommet, back up on top of the tramp and them back down the retrieval grommet to the kite.

the upside is the skipper doesn't have the spin halyard at the back of the boat, the down side is if there is any tangle you can not get at it on the water easily.

those two grommets are in my tramp and there is no way I would use them!


Hey there Jeff, your not really stopping the twists with the exit block, more like letting the twist pass through. the only way to truly get rid of the twist is to pull the halyard out and milk the twists out of it before rigging the boat. In the cover its pretty easy to see the twists when you stretch the halyard out, but not so easy in the core!

nothing worse than a jammed spin halyard...

G'day Dazz I found that the friction of pulling the halyard along the edge of the grommet induced some twist, now that I have running blocks there's no twist and it's easier

Having a core inside the spin halyard seems to worsen the tangles and curls when retrieving (and increasing crew swearing!).
I would recommend getting one of these D Splicers which work better than the hollow tubes on thin lines:
http://d-splicer.com/

I followed the instructions Dazz put up at the start of this thread and did a neat job on my new spin halyard. To do it I made one of those d splicers by using steel mig wire, it was quick to make the different lengths by just folding in half , twisted a loop in the end and tied a rope through.

Put larger grommets in the tramp to keep the friction from building up where the kite halyard runs through it. We just retro'd to #7 grommets and running it under the tramp works like a champ. The stock grommets on the C2 are WAY too small for the line to run smoothly, I think they are #2 or #3...

We've been through three different types of line and have settled (back to) on 6mm FSE Dinghy Control. It wears well, strips well, and seems to twist/tangle less than the others.

Jeff... Ian would be a great source for the halyard too!
I personally think 6mm is a bit thick. Tripp would freak out if you put that on his boat. He uses the euro style where the halyard is almost entirely dyneema, maybe only 10-15' is FSE Racing Sheet.
Ian, I know Robbie Daniel's uses stripped dinghy control as well. He said that if you strip it the polyester cover doesn't cause burn holes. I tried it years ago and I got burn holes from it. The blended dyneema of racing sheet doesn't get nearly as hot from friction.

I use dingy control where it's mostly cover and it works well for me. If I were planning on coming to Caseville I could make one for you.

Sorry all - bad form of me to post a question and then go dormant. Was travelling last week.

Understand Dazz's point all too well. We currently have 3mm Dyneema/Spectra for the last few meters of the retrieval and it is a bit hard on the hands getting the last bit of the spinnaker snuffed. I understand its there to prevent spinnaker burns and it seems to work as I have a 4 yr old practice chute with no burns in it yet.

My middle section is nearly all cover w/out core. The only cored portions are the ~.3m retrieval splice and the ~1m cleated area and splice. Thus far have had no twisting issues at all and am using the C2 under-tramp setup as described by Dazz.

A friend of mine uses a dyneema blend singlebraid (Maffioli perhaps?) for all but the last 7-8 meters. Supposedly avoids the twists and protects from burns as well. We've got a 3-day regatta this weekend so I'll watch carefully how his setup fares.

I've got a few regattas left in my current halyard. Will give making my own a try, if the results are not good, I may be subbing it out. Thanks for all your great feedback and recommendations!

so i am watching this random youtube video the other night while i was having a walk... so its going along and being fairly boring until a bit of a pitchpole happens, they sail on a bit further and its time to pull the chute, well it all all turns to crap! it's almost amusing watching them trying to deal with something that is not working that should be.

really good reminder of whatever system/rope/device you have on the boat it has to work 100% of the time. anything less is a pita.

Todd, I generally agree on the size... If I was crewing I would drop down to 5mm and probably have the straight dyneema core on the retrieval end. But I drive, and the crew gets what the crew wants, cause life works out better that way.

Bingo b!tches!

If it helps, the photo is what Mike and I run. The only way I've found to fix the twisting issue is to have two separate blocks that prevent the halyard from coming together. It's not a material choice problem.

Our finished length halyard is:
25' 3mm Ocean 3000
32' 5mm FSE Racing Sheet
12' 3mm Ocean 3000

The idea behind the tapered retrieval side is to reduce burns, friction, and weight on the kite. When dousing, you know to pop the tack line off when you hit the dyneema part.

Great thread. Thanks for the clarification on the spin halyard under the tramp setup-we don't have those fancy grommets on the Infusion so the retrieval end stays above the tramp at all times.

Our halyard is exactly as Tripp specified above, and works perfectly, with one mod. There is a polyester cover over the FSE Racing Sheet right at the cleat-I added it when the halyard blew several times on a close reach costing us at least one race. I know Tripp added the same cover to his last boat due to a similar failure at catacup. If making a halyard, I advise keeping the core as thick as possible in the area where the cleat grips, which should prevent the need for a cover. Before we had an un-tapered polyester halyard and it was rope burn city on the spinnaker, switched to the dyneema tail on the retrieval end and no more rope burns

So how many people here have the tack line attached to the bungie for the turning block (s) at the rear of the tramp? idea is to allow that/those blocks to move forward up the tramp when the kite is set.

works very well in light weather!

On the tiger and the tornado we used to run the tack line right down the stbd hull through a turning block and then to a block doing what is shown with the bungy there. Does three things.

1. it means you can pre-run the tack from aanywhere on the hull so if you end up reaching into the mark you can still set up for the rounding without sending the crew fwd.
2. Takes up all the slack in the halyard/retrieval line when down.
3. takes up slack in the tack line when the kite is up.

My boat has that, works great.

It took a little tinkering with the lengths but we got this set up on our boat under the tramp and its been great. Works especially well if you have the retrieval line running through a ring at the clew to pull the sheets into the snuffer when you douse. No extra slack in the sheets, no extra slack in the halyard.

My halyard is under the tramp.

My tackline runs under the tramp to a back to back block, then is tied off at the front beam.

That back to back block has a bungee running through it. The bungee goes through a couple of little harken blocks tired off to each corner at the rear beam. Both ends of that bungee have a block on it that the halyard runs through. I want to get rid of these blocks and switch to rings to keep asshholes from ruining my day.
The block tied off to the starboard side of the rear beam is larger because the bungee runs through it twice.

It sounds super complicated, but once you see it in person is really simple and it has a 2:1 to a 2:1 on the take up, so you've got miles of slack with kite up, but still pulls it up tight when snuffed. I haven't noticed any difference in effort to snuff the spinnaker either.

Hey Karl, have you seen the ronstan shock blocks? Absolutely ideal for spinnaker halyard take up! The rope runs a little smoother through them.

I have. Hadn't thought about using them there though.

This is a vid from Rich Vilvens Capricorn, that is a pretty tricky under the tramp halyard! looks like it works pretty well too.

As a quick follow-up on this. I decided to give it a go and stick with the original double-tapered design based on 5mm Robline Dinghy control. I have an undertramp takeup that works well and didn't want to risk the chance messing up the delicate balance.

Turns out my concerns on doing this myself were completely unfounded. This YouTube video was hugely helpful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bWZpUQZO8E#t=190

Hardest part was digging the effing core out of the plait. Had to borrow my wife's reading glasses just to see what the heck I was doing. I think it took all of a couple hours beginning to end. Next time would be half that.

Now its on to making a new set of dyneema trap lines...

I'm stupid. I pull the entire core out, and stuff in a different color, just because I'm a douche, and like having things that aren't off the shelf. But yeah, it takes some patience to pull the dyneema through that tight weave.

The more you do it, the better you get. I could make a halyard in 15 minutes at one point. I haven't had to do it in at least a year and a half, but my spare is gone, on the boat, and it's looking tired, so time to make a couple more for myself. I'm sure it'll go swimmingly....

Start buying line by the spool.

I could make them in about 8 minutes each of I was making 5 or more at a time. Not any more though

It is easier to use a 5mm single braid like Robline Racing sheet or Mafioli Swiftcord spliced into 3mm dyneema, which is also single braid. Much easier and faster. I hate trying to splice those tightly woven covers.

I remember you mentioned it being tough to work with. Now I'm a believer. Not sure I'll try that tight braid again. Picking the plates out of the cover to taper it was maddening.

Hmm, I didn't hear anyone mention splicing in a soft shackle to the head of the halyard? I've done that on my last two halyards and its worked great! Very clean. I do the soft shackle first and then strip the core out of the cover to make sure I get the length correct and then cut off the extra cover to provide the tail for the kite.

Here is the youtube link for the integrated softshackle:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRKOkYqWpug