P19 Mast raising

Lewis Baumstark (lbaum@preferred.com)
Mon, 28 Dec 1998 16:02:42 -0500


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West Wight Potter Website at URL
http://www.lesbois.com/wwpotter/
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I'm a little late to this thread because of the holidays, but I'd like to
add my "2 cents." I have a P15 but my previous boat had a 23' mast, about
the same size as a P19. I bought it used with no instruction as to rigging.
Luckily I had Robert Burgess' book Handbook of Trailer Sailing. he
discusses mast raising on page 35-37. Basically what he reccommends is
using a temporary forestay to hold the mast in place while attaching the
forestay. It worked like this for me:

I had a mast crutch in the rear of the cockpit, I left the mast
resting in this crutch (I never disconnected the side stays) while I
attached the mast to the step loosely; I used the topping lift extended
with the jib downhaul for the temporary forestay, using the forestay padeye
for a block; with this line in my hand or teeth or whereever, I walked the
mast up to the upright position , keeping the slack out of the line, and
making sure the side stays didn't foul; with the mast upright I tied the
temporary forestay off to a cleat on the mast, went forward and attached the
forestay.

Admittely it was a juggling act, but after a couple of times doing it, it
was relatively easy.

But then that's one of the reasons I got the P15, much easier to rig and
trailer.

Lewis Baumstark
P15 - Water Music
Northeast Tn.