Here is a little tip: When I replaced my wire halyards with sampson spectron cored line I stripped off some of the cover of the line so I only had the 3/16 spectron line running over the sheaves in the masthead sheave block. I then spliced eyes in the covers that I had stripped off and use them for messengers to allow me to pull the bare spectron back inside the mast when I am not sailing. Since I used different colors for each of the halyards the covers that I stripped off match the covered part of the halyards and my messengers are color cordinated - making it much easier to identify them. I also used luggage tag splices on the end of the halyards so I can replace the shackles if neccessar without having to resplice the line.
