Tethers for Single-Handing

[K9Kampers]

Night Sailor says:

As Chip says, us gray-haired folks know we have other considerations. My heart problem appeard out of nowhere. I found that a lot of my youthful idealism and sense of personal invulnerablity was over optimistic ...... so now I'm now a more cautious sailor than ever before.

Yeah, this rings true whenever I do something youthful like jump off the roof into a snow bank and then look in the mirror and count greys! (hairs, not aliens)

Between reading these boards and being out there in the winds that I crave, I find myself reconsidering my on-deck practices. It's one thing to step away from the helm in the lightest of winds with no worries, and yet another to consider life / death consequences under harsh conditions. On a recent Maine coast cruise, singlehanding in rough conditions, I tied myself to the helm with a length of line that I could shorten with a knot while in the cockpit yet long enough to reach the mast when I had to go on deck while pointing into the wind.

One thing I'm considering is rigging a 10' tetherline with clip to the mastbase, and another in the cockpit so as to be able to clip in / out and be anywhere on the boat.

[eric3a]

..

[RickJ]

I'm thinking of running a jackline from the mast base to the cockpit console, so I can have a short tether that will slide along it. This should give good access between the console and the mast (as far forward as I should need to go), and always keep me on the boat. I remember an earlier thread that concluded that any kind of going over the side when single-handing is bad news, however well attached, because you just may not be able to climb back on.

The jackline needs to have minimum slack for this, and although the obvious console attachment is the mainsheet eye, I'm not sure if this is strong enough to take the load a jackline would impose if a person's full weight were thrown sideways across the boat. That's the scenario where the jackline/tether is really going to be needed.

Any thoughts? I wonder if it would be better to add a dedicated attachment at the console base, where it is close to the mounting bolts. This should be a lot stronger, and could even be reinforced directly to the bolts.

It also means the hatch has to be held shut to stop the jackline falling loose, but I've already done a mod for that (it's also a replacement lock for the hatch, replacing the hasp - I'll post it in the mods section when I've taken photos). Might even need to reinforce the aft edge of the hatch too!

Cheers, Rick