Rob - just looked at the pictures on the blog. The picture with the plate removed shows old holes that appear to be elongated. Did that interfere with drilling the new rivet holes?

No that was an instance of my poor mechanical skills. The drill wandered and it was a struggle to get the old rivets out. I'm using a center punch on the port side. The new plate matches the old holes exactly.

Does thru bar have a tight fit or are there pins to keep it in place?

also, your blog is down, do you think you could post pics to this forum when you get a chance?

many thanks

I completed the installation tonite. Check http://sailnordicstar.blogspot.com/ for some more photos and commentary.

Great job fitting the thru bar on Nordic Star. Do you have a contact person at Annoplis Rigging Company for the thru-bar spreader kit?

The contact person at Annapolis rigging is Jay Herman. His cell number is 410-493-9522.

Completed my spreader fix this weekend, overall a success but thought I would add some notes about differences I encountered:

-my bar was marked to insert from STBD > PORT; everything I read had said the opposite

-my bar was NOT marked for centering, we had to just play with it to get it right

-the up-swept angle of the two sides of the bar was not the same on both sides. When we got things together we could see that things were not the same on both sides and at first were blaming this defect. However, once we did some math we realized that the angle difference observed was more than could be account for by the defect. Upon further inspection we realized that a bit of the mast needed to be filed; it was forcing one side higher than the other. Once we did this the angles were acceptable.

-we had problems with the riveter at first (bought a Big Daddy riviter off ebay for the job). Once we figured it out what was wrong (user error), things went great. But I'm waiting on a few more rivets from Annapolis Rigging to finish the job.

-having the Big Daddy riviter was nice, if anyone wants to borrow it just let me know and I could ship it out. It fears no 1/4" rivet.

-for a $500 or whatever it was bit of metal work, they really should include some detailed instructions.

Overall I'm happy with the job. REALLY hated cutting all that material out of the mast though. I assume no one has had any problems with hard-driven J/30s with the Annapolis Rigging kit, so maybe its all in my head.

Finally, I just noticed on this thread that the topping lift was supposed to be run IN FRONT of the spreader bar instead of behind - I ran everything behind - anyone know if this will be a problem?

-dan

Bumping an old thread... I have the mast down on NH again and would like to modify the spreaders. Being in Canada, the kit from Annapolis is going to take too long to get and we do have the means to fab up our own. Does anyone have any line drawings or dimensions? I probably can measure the angles on the existing spreaders and attempt something myself, but it would be easier to work from a pre-existing design.

The other option is I just weld on a collar across the front of the mast.

Thanks!

I should actually do this too when I next have the stick pulled. What's the best option these days? I'm assuming the riggers listed in the article all sell kits that my local yard can install?

Alex,

That article is almost 20 years old and some of those places are no longer in business. I know you can contact Corey Butlin at Hall Spars or Annapolis Rigging. I would definitely get this done if your boat has not got the fix installed.