When your SAGA yacht arrives at the commissioning boat yard, there are many pieces of equipment not installed. The smaller items will be packed inside the boat, larger items will be on the boat trailer. The pulpit, dorade vents and their guardrails, lifelines and stanchions can’t be installed because of highway bridge height restrictions. Various blocks are left off to prevent damage and pilferage.
You will find the lifelines and stanchions taped together and marked Port and Starboard with a Top and Bottom for each lifeline. Before installing the stanchions, find the box that contains the furling line blocks. Install the blocks on 3 the stanchions as needed and then place the stanchions into the bases along each toerail. The two stanchions at each lifeline gate have diagonal braces.
After installing the stanchion, screw down the diagonal brace using a sealant in the screw hole. Each stanchion has a fastening bolt that is inserted into the stanchion base from the outboard side. Use Loc Tite® or a marine sealant on the threads of the bolt to prevent loosening. The stanchions are slightly loose in the bases to prevent interaction between the SS and aluminum in salt water that could cause the stanchions to seize in the bases.
Unroll the lifelines, attach one end to the gate stanchions (fore and aft) and insert the other end through each stanchion in sequence. The next step will require two people.
Before the bow and stern rails can be installed, the navigation lights they carry must be hooked up. The electrical wires will be sticking up from two sockets on the bowsprit and from the deck aft, outboard of the cockpit coaming. The wires from the boat have male/female electrical plugs with corresponding plugs hanging from two legs of the pulpit and one leg of the pushpit. Connect the wires and tape over the connections with electrical tape.
Place the pulpit legs into their respective sockets and push down until the attaching screw can be inserted into the corresponding threaded hole in each leg. If there is resistance in the two sockets with wiring, you must go below and crawl into the anchor locker. Gently pull down on the wires where they come through the deck. This will prevent pinching the wires between the pulpit legs and the socket.
When all of the screws in the sockets have been tightened, you may attach the lifelines to the appropriate places on the pulpit.
The pushpit (stern rail) is fastened to the boat with through bolts in each base. The fastener holes have been drilled at the plant and then filled with a soft putty for travel. When you remove the putty, be sure that all of it is cleared from the holes. The bolts, nuts and washers will be found with the other deck gear in a package marked: “stern rail bolts”. A small tube of non-adhesive marine sealant is needed to seal the bolt holes. Don’t fill the holes with the sealant! Wrap each bolt with a layer of the sealant from the head down for about an inch. This provides a better seal and makes the job of the person in the lazarette slightly easier while they tighten the nuts on each bolt. As with the pulpit, once the bolts have been tightened you attach the lifelines to the eyes on the rail.
In addition to the stanchion mounted furling line blocks, there are two small swivel blocks that will need mounting on the pulpit; they are the first lead blocks aft of the furling drums.
The number of blocks used for the self-tacking jib is determined by the sheeting system on your boat. Three blocks are needed for our original system and two are used when the jib sheet goes up and into the mast.
At the mast collar, you will shackle on blocks for the main halyard, main sheet, and the two reefing lines. If you have the in-mast sheeting system, a block is needed for the jib sheet. You may decide how you wish to place the blocks according to your own preferences. Our normal layout puts one block on the port side for the main halyard, then the main sheet block with the two reef lines on the aft face of the collar and a final block to starboard.
The main sheet block system has the following components: One fiddle block with becket, one double and three singles. The fiddle block is shackled to the main traveler car, the double block goes on the after bail on the underside of the boom, one single block is attached to the forward bail, the next is shackled to the vang tang on the boom and the third will go on the mast collar.
Messenger cords are run in the deck molding to allow you to pull the necessary lines through to the line jammers by the companionway.
The SS rails that protect the dorade cowls are mounted on small metal stubs that are screwed to the deck with fasteners through the leg into the stub. The rails are marked as to proper location on the deck.