Backstay Eyebolt Repair

Well, it's been said that owning a boat is process of constant maintenance, and Ellipsis certainly demonstrates that fact. Following our successful stem fitting repair and wonderful sail on the South Puget Sound, Liz and I discovered that the backstay eyebolt/chainplate had pulled up from the deck about 1/8". Clearly, this must be fixed! This post establishes what the problem is and what we have to work with. In a later post, I will chronicle how we repair it.






This is the eyebolt/chainplate as we found it, pulling up out of the transom.


Note the cracks in the surface of the decking.


The eyebolt was easily unscrewed by putting a nail through the hole for extra torque. Upon removal, I noted some damage to the threads (visible in this photo) and I measured it. It is a 1/2" bolt. Older Catalina 22's had 3/8" bolts, but ours either had this one stock, or it was upgraded by a previous owner.

The hole in the transom does not go all the way through to the open space below. Thus, the eyebolt was not secured with a washer and nut.


In this closeup view, you can see that there are metal threads embedded in the transom. I've read that C22's often have a bronze bar along the top of the transom, but this metal appears more silvery or steel colored to my untrained eye. Not easily seen in this photo is a much thinner layer of threaded yellow (bronze?) colored metal above the steel threads. Could someone have glassed or epoxied in a nut below the bronze bar? The area is not accessible from below decks, so I cannot inspect from below. Even so, the hole doesn't go all the way through, so I doubt I'd see anything useful in any case.

Liz and I are considering our options for this repair, and I will post our solution when we decide what to do.

Mast Raising System

One new innovation we used on our first sail of the Puget Sound was a nifty mast raising system. It really made launching a lot easier, so I thought I'd share a photo essay of how we built it.

The system is an A-frame type, based on instructions we found in the Catalina 22 Technical manual (the one distributed by the Cat 22 National Association). Many thanks to Dick King for his detailed instructions!


Here is a photo of the finished assembly, leaning against the boat.





The frame is made out of 3/4" steel electrical conduit, each piece about 80 inches long. The ends of each piece were hammered flat, with the opposite end of each one flattened at 90 degrees to the other end.



Holes for 5/16" bolts and clevis pins were drilled into each end, and the sharp edges rounded and smoothed.



Two short pieces were fashioned into adapters that could fit over the forward lower shroud chainplate eyebolts. The picture below shows how it all fits together.



We quickly discovered that these short pieces could not be hammered flat (and besides, hammering conduit flat takes a mighty effort). So, we picked up a massive workbench vise at Lowes (on sale for half price!--$35) and used it to flatten the adapter pieces. Simplicity itself!



Because the goal was to use the trailer winch to hoist the mast, we improvised a bow "roller" using a couple of "bar brackets" from the hardware store. These are the things you use to bar a gate with a 2x4.




Here is the assembled bow "roller". We added a piece of conduit so the trailer winch strap could slide freely.



The bow "roller," attached to the stem fitting.

I'll post more pictures later, but for an idea of how it all works, get a copy of the Technical Manual and read Dick King's article, entitled "Mast Raising." Thanks again, Dick! This rig worked like a charm.