Friggin' with the Riggin' Again

I'm friggin' with the riggin' again. Sounds like a title to a Country & Western song! :-)  Sorry, no offense you C&W lovers out there. The new pulley blocks are "BEAFY". Way overkill but they should get the job done. After I switched the cables from the electric winch to the hand winch and vice versa I rigged the two blocks. Hmmm? This ain't gonna work!

That's what's known in the 'Backyard Eyeball Engineering' field as a 'Cluster F*ck!'. The end of the main hoisting wire has to be anchored as near the top of the gin pole as possible providing the most lifting height. Tried rigging a chain around the pole to attach the end of the cable. Ended up with this.

See the problem(s) here? The hoisting cable runs outside of the block before it lands on the sheave. The new pulley blocks don't swivel allowing the cable to self align. Hmmm? Now what the heck am I gonna do? The chain anchoring the end of the cable isn't gonna work for me either. I'll switch the u-bolt back around to the front and use the chain around the pole for the supporting straps instead.

The lower pulley works perfect. Well almost. This block will take most of the strain of the flip. First lifting then paying out as the boat is lowered. I am afraid the block could fall out of the u-bolt as the transition from pulling to paying out happens so I used some mechanics wire to 'mouse the hook'.

This will prevent the hook from falling off the u-bolt. The cheep Chinese made hooks don't have enough curve in the tip of the hook to hold the seizing wire so I had to Dremel out a groove to allow the wire to stay in place.

What else did I get done today? Oh yeah, I added a couple of diagonal braces to the main lifting side of the frame. This will greatly increase the strength of the 2X6. Without the braces the strength of the 2X6 is about 450 lbs and with them about 1650 lbs or so.

I'll do the same on the other tow lifting/pulling points.

More 'Friggin' with the Riggin' tomorrow.

Standby.....