Re Rigging a Spinnaker Halyard on a Feva

After two years of racing our RS Feva some parts have worn out and we are suffering with more breakages.

With the Worlds coming up this summer we have been making sure our Feva is ready to go and will not break down during the event. Recently, at the Itchenor Schools week, we had problems with our Gennaker. We soon realised one of the problems was that our halyard was twisting and kinking, so it was not running very smoothly and, after we took the foredeck apart, we found out that many of the blocks were worn out.

Over the week we went out and bought four high quality ball bearing blocks and a new Gennaker Pole. Steve Cockerill kindly gave us a new Rooster Spinfast Gennaker halyard. We chose this halyard as it is does not twist or kink.

We got together all our tools which included three different sized allen keys, one Philips screwdriver and a knife. We started off by taking the fore deck off and unscrewing all the blocks and getting rid of them whilst keeping the springs to hold the new blocks up. We then cleaned out the foredeck and left it to dry. One hour later we came back and screwed in all the new blocks with a touch of sika-flex to make sure they are secure. Then we threaded the new pole in and rigged the new halyard and re-attached the fore-deck.

We decided to put the mast up and test it all out with our new spinnaker, it all worked smoothly and ran the best it has ever before which was very satisfying for Jamie. After flying the kite we thought the halyard was too long as there was a risk of it getting caught under the pole, so we measured how far the halyard would need to come out in light winds when the gennaker is fully let out. We cut around a metre off which meant we had a 13 metre halyard. (Note Rooster Feva Spinfast Spinnaker Halyards now measure 13.5m)

We are looking forward to testing it out on the water on Saturday and are really excited to go to Spain for the RS Feva Worlds.

Remove all the bolts and screws and store them safe.

A very worn block

Remove all the blocks

Screw in all the blocks with a touch of sika-flex

Attach the halyard making sure it is rigged right

We take our halyard all the way to the back so if Jamie is sorting out a problem I can still drop the kite.

Double check the halyard is rigged right and then screw on the foredeck making sure it is secure.

Rig the mast and check the system works by rigging the kite and doing a few hoist and drops.

Feva 4963 Louis Wright and Jamie Allen