Hello fellow LM owners. I got myself a LM27 in desember, i have never owned a boat with sails or a mast before. I bought the boat with the intention to just use the engine, but now i wanna learn to use sails. Only problem is that the previous owner took the mast of the boat and now i need to put everything up. Is there any guide how to set up the mast and sails. Something that tells me where everything should be. I am sorry for the dumb question but i am newbie. Information about the boat LM 27 1976 Volvo penta D2-40 40HP The previous owner bought new sails before he sold me the boat.
Hello fellow LM owners. I got myself a LM27 in desember, i have never owned a boat with sails or a mast before. I bought the boat with the intention to just use the engine, but now i wanna learn to use sails. Only problem is that the previous owner took the mast of the boat and now i need to put everything up. Is there any guide how to set up the mast and sails. Something that tells me where everything should be. I am sorry for the dumb question but i am newbie. Information about the boat LM 27 1976 Volvo penta D2-40 40HP The previous owner bought new sails before he sold me the boat.
Hi faroeislands, and welcome to the Forum. Where are you based?
You will need a crane to lift the mast into position on the boat, unless your mast base is fitted with a tabernacle (and even then you will need additional equipment). It is in any case definitely NOT a job to be done either alone or if you are in any doubt about what you are doing, as there is a real risk of causing serious damage to the boat and/or the mast and/or the people involved or near the boat. I suggest you consider paying a boatyard to do it, at least for the first time, and watch what they do.
If you can find (perhaps even pay) someone experienced in sailing to help you rig and first sail your boat, or even just take you out sailing on another boat, that would be extremely helpful to you. It can be very confusing at first. It will be well worth reading and watching videos about learning to sail. A basic sail instruction course would be very valuable to you.
Before the mast is raised, you will need all the relevant running rigging (halyards etc.) in place, and all the standing rigging (the rigging wires holding up the mast and taking the strain of the sails) each in the correct positions on the mast (with the correct length and correct fittings for each).
The following is from memory, so apologies if I have missed anything.
STANDING RIGGING The LM27 mast is held up by the following wires: - a single backstay from the back of the mast top to the fitting on the stern; - a single forestay from the front of the mast top to the bow fitting; - two shrouds, one each side from the side of the mast top to the 'chainplate' fitting on the outside edge of the side deck; - four lowers, two each side, from a fitting around the height of the mast spreaders. On each side, one goes forward and one aft, to fittings (typically an inverted U shape), near the inside edge of the side decks.
The fitting on the deck at the foot of the mast may have a choice of positions fore and aft for the mast. If you can see where the mast has been in position before, then use that position, if the previous position is not clear then put the mast in the central position.
Once the mast is vertical and the stays and shrouds are connected to the bow, stern and outer chainplates, then those wires will hold the mast up temporarily with very little tension. You can then fit the four lowers which will give additional stability.
You must then properly tension the wires. This is done using a special rig tension gauge, or a variety of techniques for measuring the tension of the wire, and you can read about these online. An experienced person will be able to tension it approximately without these . Note that cruising boats typically have inadequate tension of the rigging, which paradoxically puts additional loads on the rig. On the other hand, you do not want the extreme tensions typically used in racing boats - that is unnecessary and the fittings on the LM are not designed and built to take it that sort of tension. (Note that both the bow fitting and the inner side deck fittings for the lowers on the LM are not very robust, and some LM owners have had problems with these, so don't overdo it!) There is a copy of a guide issued by LM elsewhere on this forum (I will find it later and put a link in this thread) about sails and reefing, which includes guidance for tensioning the lowers. Note that this says the aft lowers require very little tension - they are just there to stop the mast buckling forward.
RUNNING RIGGING This will include ropes from the mast including the following (there could be others): - main halyard from aft the top of the mast down to the forward end of the boom; - a topping lift, also from the aft of the top of the mast, but exiting higher or further back than the main halyard, and going down to the aft end of the boom' - a foresail halyard from the front of the top of the mast down to somewhere near the bow fitting (it may come down from the top of the front of the mast through a fitting a little lower down if the boat is fitting with roller reefing for the foresail): - (optional) a spinnaker halyard from a fitting perhaps 3/4 the way up the mast - (optional) signal halyards - thin cords, one each side, tied in a continuous loop from fittings on the underside of the mast spreaders down to near the deck. - (optional) lazy jacks - thin cords from either side of the mast somewhere around the height of the spreaders or a little above them, or actually from the spreaders themselves, and supporting a fan of thin cords fixed about the boom.
Running rigging ropes not on the mast will include the following (there could be others): - mainsheet - a 4 or more part block and tackle between the aft end of the boom and the short mainsheet track on the aft deck, with the 'loose' single rope end at the aft deck end; - foresheets - one each side going from the clew (aft corner) of the foresail back to and round the genoa winches and then to a cleat near the winch; - clew outhaul - a small rope (possibly a small block and tackle) between the clew (aft corner) of the mainsail and the aft end of the boom (it might then go into the boom and emerge at the front of the boom); - (optional) reefing lines - there could be 1, 2 or 3 of these - small diameter ropes running from the boom up to eyes part way up the leech (aft edge) of the mainsail and back down to the boom (they may then continue to the forward end of the boom, and possibly even be taken round blocks and continue back to the cockpit.
I hope that gives you some pointers, but you might want to come back with more specific queries.