Splicing New Reefing Lines

Polerys didn’t come with reefing lines. Well, not real reefing lines. The original setup was to tie some rope to an eye on the port side, then loop it through a reefing loop on the sail, then cleat it on the starboard side. If you wanted to use the second reef point, you’d use the same rope and process, but through the second loop on the sail. If only there was a better way.

With the eventual goal of sailing around the world, I want to run all lines to the cockpit. So I got 2 x 200 foot lines. One purple and one blue. I wanted to get a green line instead of purple, so it would be easy to remember. “Blue for blue water, green for green water.” Sadly, the green line was twice as much as the purple. So purple it is.

 

 

 

 

The first step was to splice in eyes. This was our first time doing it. We loaded up a YouTube tutorial, and paused frequently. The line we are using is 5/16 double braided polyester. I originally wanted a Dyneema cored polyester, but that was entirely out of my budget.

For the most part, we could figure out how to do it. But actually doing it was a fair bit of work. Especially the last step, where you feed the loop back into the shaft. That took a ton of brute force.

 

Eventually we got to the point that the lines were close enough. Lauren’s went by more smoothly. On mine, a little bit of the core was still visible, but for the life of us, we couldn’t get that inside the sheath. We pulled and pulled and pulled. This was as good as it was going to get. So after applying some aloe to our rope burns, we called it.

 

 

 

 

Next up was the mounting process. The boom is closed, so bolt and nut is not possible. I didn’t think that rivets would be strong enough. I tried a self taping screw, but that was a huge failure. So the final option (which I just avoided due to laziness) was to tap it correctly. Suddenly, it was super easy to do.

Once I started using the correct process, it only took me an hour on my own to install the eye loops, the blocks, and the ropes.

 

 

I had considered mounting the eye bracket through the rope eye, but decided to use shackles instead, so it would be easier to remove later, if needed.

Then came the fun part. Pulling 200 feet of rope through the sail to the first block. Then pulling 200 feet of rope through the second block. Then the third. Then pulling the second 200 feet of rope through it’s first block… Naturally, I found a knot half way through running the second line. So that was an hour to get untangled. I clearly need to go to a gym.

 

Now both reefing lines are installed. I won’t be able to run the lines to the cockpit just quite yet. I have the deck blocks, but to install the backing plate, I need to pull the mast because there’s a huge box around the mast that blocks my access to the deck. Hopefully that will be in the Summer of 2021.