20/08/2026
Roaring Forty has been at Newcastle Cruising Yacht Club since my return from Lord Howe Island following my unfortunate retirement from the Solo TransTasman Yacht Challenge.
After three years sailing close to 40,000 nm in the wildest seas on the planet, its mast out and rigging time for Roaring Forty. Thanks to Patrick and Liam from Newcastle Yacht Rigging, and old mate Neil for helping unstep my 2006 Southern Spars mast at Midcoast Boatyard & Marine in Newcastle.
Jon at Any Port Marine has shipped my Karver KFX Structural Furler off to Karver Sailing France for an overhaul and some production upgrades, so we should have the furler back before the rod rigging is delivered.
New rigging pins will be machined and I serviced the original Karver Backstay Blocks. Shaving foam helps keep the ball bearings in place during reassembly as it can be rinsed out with fresh water and dried before lubrication is applied. I also whipped up some nice new dyneema covered loops for the backstay blocks instead of using plain dyneema lashings.
Quick trip down to Sydney Rigging Specialists tomorrow to drop off the rigging and hopefully in a couple of weeks the new parts will arrive and they can cold head the new rigging and ship back to me.
Plenty to keep me busy over the next few weeks including a new headstay bracket, mast sheave service, new Raymarine STNG wind transducer and cable, new NKE wind transducer cable, new Windex and new dyneema lashings on the Inner Forestay, twin Backstays, Runners and Checkstays.
Brain Tumour Alliance Australia (BTAA)
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