The handcrafted fork-harvester that retires the lazy jack

Marco Mastantuono, a sailor from Ancona and our reader, has come up with a system that will make you discuss. A steel fork-mounted hawser catcher (attached to the boom with a bracket), which replaces the lazy jack and, according to him, eliminates any risk of “snagging” both in hoisting and lowering and in changing the sail.

Why the fork damper.

“In years past when I went out on my boat alone,” he wrote us, “I used like everyone else the lazy jack that allowed the mainsail to be retracted into the canopy on the return. As time went on, I realized that often in hoisting the sail, the sail would get caught in the lazy jack tops and I would have to partially drop the sail.”

From there, the idea of the fork-mounted damper. “I built with my own hands (I am not a craftsman) an attachment that allowed me to get rid of the topsails while also allowing the mainsail to rest and then later cover it. I have kept this tool for 5 years and it has never given me any problems.

The new owner also liked it

I sold my boat and the buyer in the meantime changed the mast (higher than 1 meter),shrouds the boom and sails (the racing ones),electrical system etc…. It’s been 10 years and one thing hasn’t changed, the hail collecting forks! He wrote me that they were too comfortable and by changing the boom he had adapted the forks to the new boom shape.”

The detail of the fork support: the steel has been in use for 15 years, the first signs of rust can be seen

The advantages of the fork-mounted damper.

Continued Mastantuono, “For me, the advantages are:
– A cleaner look without the lazy jack web.
– Convenience in hoisting and lowering the sail on re-entry, even in wide windward;
– Less drag for selvedges and canopy, which, if only slightly, restrain boat speed;
– Finally in mainsail replacement no entanglement resulting from the topsails.”

“This I did not do,” Mastantuono concludes, “so that others would necessarily have to adopt this method, but only to illustrate that with personal experience one can find solutions that suit one’s needs.”

What do you think of the idea?

If you would like to learn more about the fork-mounted damper collection system, you can email Marco Mastantuono at corallo_mm@libero.it

Fork picker, details in photos

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