Mast Stepping System

  I had discovered this system in an American yachting magazine many years ago and the author of the article had written it was widely used in Holland, where there are many bridges.   

    The system allows to step a mast using only a hinged mast step, a hinge (a fork and an eye) in the capshrouds along the same axis as the hinge in the mast step and a tang on the forward face of the mast, near its base, to connect the spinnaker pole.

    The unstepped mast is placed on the deck and the pin inserted in the hinge. The whisker pole is placed  vertically near the base of the mast, held aft by a halyard, laterally by a pair of shrouds connected to the hinge in the shrouds (a shackle in place of the pin linking the fork to the eye).

The mast and cap-shrouds, and the pole and its shrouds form two isoceles triangles pivoting around a common base, materialized by the hinge in the mast step and in the shrouds.

By pulling on the pole with a four-part tackle shackled to the stemhead, its fall brought to a winch (or a windlass), the mast is brought to the vertical.  The combined power of a tackle and a winch makes it possible to pull the mast up with a moderate effort.

I have used this system dozens of times, often single-handed, whether to step or unstep the mast whenever I have to haul the boat on its trailer.