Messenger line safety hack
Hi all,
For those who take their running rigging lines out each winter: as I do and recommend for a wide variety of reasons, I have the following suggestion.
I have never been happy watching the light messenger line blowing about in the high winds that occasionally occur: it just looked like a recipe for somesort of mischief.
A few years ago. I started twirling (like a barber pole) the messenger lines around something solid (jib and staysail furlers foils, a shroud for the flag halyard, etc) on their way to the deck. This keeps them very well behaved and far less likely to part or to jump of its sheave.
And since then, I have read but forget where, that a twirling protrusion causes less build up of pressure on the object twirled around which is why some tall chimneys have a twirling protuberance of some sort: any engineers out there care to comment?
My best, Dick Stevenson, s/v Alchemy