Mast Head Light

[erobitaille]

Has any one replaced the anchor light wiring while the mast was up. My anchor light has not been working so I went up the mast to check it out. The bulb is ok, checked with a meter, so I checked for voltage got ZERO. I pull the light fixture off and the wires had corroded off and fallen down the mast. It was getting dark so I could not see anything inside the mast.
So how the heck do you rewire with out pulling the mast?

 

[treilley]

Temporary light until the mast comes down next. You can hoist a light up one of the halyards when needed. A little messy but it does work.

 

[dwigle]

If your mast is like mine with a tube holding the light above the mast, I doubt that the wires fell into the mast, but are still in the little tube that the anchor light attaches to. Under the tube, the wires are only in the main section of the mast for a few inches before they go into a channel under the sail track. While I wouldn't want to do it up the mast, you might be able to fish them out with some really long, skinny needle nose pliers. However, before I pulled my mast, my light didn't work and I used a portable light either on the flag halyard, or off the backstay.

Don Wigle
Wiggle Room
E38 #8

 

[erobitaille]

I have used the lantern up the forestay or back stay on my smaller boat. I have a set of ten inch forcepts so I'll try to see if i can grab the wires.

 

[rwthomas1]

I just fought with the wiring in the mast of my E38. My anchor light is mounted on a welded tube with a flat circular disk on top that the light screws to. The anchor light wiring had a knot in it just below the top of the mast that was just visible if you looked down the tube. The wiring in my mast is run up rings that are riveted to the back side of the mast. There is no tube/track, etc. in the mast. You can try to grab the wires but there is not much room in my setup and there is pretty much no way to pull another wire up without an existing snake/mouse line. It may be possible to pull out the VHF cable with a line tied to it and then pull the VHF AND a new wire back in. It would be very tough with the mast up I think. RT

 

[Glyn Judson]

Grabbing wire.

Pat, Ed, Rob and all, I wonder if a pair of mechanical fingers mightn't be small enough in diameter to get into that tube to grab those wires? Glyn Judson, E31 hull#55, Marina del Rey, CA

 

[erobitaille]

Thanks for a the great ideas. I'm going up the mast this weekend but, it looks like this is one that will wait until the mast is pulled some time in the future.

If you habe noticed the Admiral, read wife, never liked the name I gave our boat. SInce she let me spend a ton of money, she is also the CFO, on the boat this spring she got to rename her. So going forward, i still have to file the papers with the CG, the boat is now Sapphire and Tonic. actualy it goes very well with the light blue accent line.

 

[jkm]

I have a bottle of Bombay-CFO says it's way to pretty to drink. I use Tanqueray and just stare lustily at the sapphire nectar.

May sneak it into another bottle and refill with Scope!

Will I get away with it??

j

 

[footrope]

Refill with plain water. Bombay Sapphire gin is clear, the bottle is colored. Enjoy.

 

[jkm]

Thanks Craig

The Boss won't even let me open it.

John