preventing knots in spinnaker halyards?

   Had a massive problem with this on my daughter's 29er at the Nationals this year. Brand new halyard tangled on pretty near every hoist, despite me stripping it off the boat between races and stretching it, folding it instead of coiling it etc. And that was with an elastic takeup! Borrowed a halyard off someone's spare mast and the problem was instantly cured.
My research since then leads me to believe it's all about the type of rope. On paper a dyneema core with a soft braid seems like the ideal solution but I think the opposite is true, as the core just winds up and springs the rope into kinks whenever you cycle the load on and off. So I think you want a rope with a soft core and a solid load-bearing outer.

Other tips seem to be:
1. never coil it up when towing. Fold it instead
2. elastic take-up if poss
3. big armfuls to keep it under tension all the way up / down
4. put the new halyard through the washing machine to take the spring out of it

Author	Message Share Topic Printable Version Delicious Digg Facebook Furl Google MySpace Newsvine reddit StumbleUpon Translate Twitter Windows Live Yahoo Bookmarks Topic Search Topic Options Post Reply Create New Topic
ohFFsake Send Private Message Find Member's Posts Far too distracted from work Joined: 04 Sep 08 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 219	Post Options Post Reply Quote ohFFsake Report Post Quote Reply Topic: preventing knots in spinnaker halyards? Posted: 18 Oct 17 at 10:29pm
	Had a massive problem with this on my daughter's 29er at the Nationals this year. Brand new halyard tangled on pretty near every hoist, despite me stripping it off the boat between races and stretching it, folding it instead of coiling it etc. And that was with an elastic takeup! Borrowed a halyard off someone's spare mast and the problem was instantly cured. My research since then leads me to believe it's all about the type of rope. On paper a dyneema core with a soft braid seems like the ideal solution but I think the opposite is true, as the core just winds up and springs the rope into kinks whenever you cycle the load on and off. So I think you want a rope with a soft core and a solid load-bearing outer. Other tips seem to be: 1. never coil it up when towing. Fold it instead 2. elastic take-up if poss 3. big armfuls to keep it under tension all the way up / down 4. put the new halyard through the washing machine to take the spring out of it