Stepping the Mast on an Ensign

The Ensign mast is stepped directly on the cabin floor through an opening in the cabin top. Since, at SLSC, there is no deep-water seawall or crane available for handling the Ensign mast, the mast must be stepped and unstepped dockside at the main floating dock. The old procedure was to round up a gang of six to eight bystanders to muscle the mast upright or implement a controlled fall. This situation did not sit well with the engineering mind of some of the Ensign owners. Several innovations and trials led to development of a gin pole to assist in raising and lowering the Ensign mast. Raising and lowering an Ensign mast can now be accomplished by two persons.

Ensign Mast Raising Checklist

The procedure that follows has a number of steps, but it's really pretty easy once you've done it a couple of times.

1. Position gin pole and wooden base on the cabin top in front of the mast opening. You can see the gin pole resting on the wooden base below, and Ed, on the right, is ready to attach the shrouds.
   
   
   
   
   
2. Secure pole side stays to the aft chain plates, below, and pole forestay to the jib tack. 
   
   
   
   
   
3. Secure upper auxiliary pole forestay to the jib tack.
   
   
   
   
   
4. Secure both pole forestays to the foredeck cleat. Our gin pole is fractionally rigged, so it has two forestays, an upper and a lower.
   
   
   
   
   
5. Inspect the lifting halyard to assure it is running free.
   
   
   
   
   
6. Position the mast on the boat inside the gin pole side stay, masthead to the stern, forward side facing up, and the spreaders close to the cabin top edge.
   
   
   
   
   
7. The mast is now properly positioned on the boat.
   
   
   
   
   
8. Secure the lifting harness to the mast by making a loop around the mast and loose lines and stays but inside the mast upper stays.
   
   
   
   
   
9. Finish with a bowline knot and position the loop close to the spreaders.
   
   
   
   
   
10. As one person raises the mast by pulling the bridle lift line, the other person controls and guides the mast butt to keep the mast centered on the boat and the lifting harness as near vertical as possible during the mast transition from horizontal to vertical.
    
    
    
    
    
11. Care must be taken to keep the mast spreaders aft of the gin pole side stays.
    
    
    
    
    
12. Once the mast butt has cleared the cabin top, the mast is slowly lowered into the cabin top opening.
    
    
    
    
    
13. The mast control person then enters the cabin to guide the mast butt onto the mast step.
    
    
    
    
    
14. The mast butt is guided onto the step.
    
    
    
    
    
15. Once the mast is in place, the lifting harness loop is lowered and the gin pole can be removed.
    
    
    
    
    
16. The mast upper side stays can be attached to the center chain plates before removing the gin pole if wave conditions call for an immediate dampening of mast movement. The gin pole is brought back down to the dock.
    
    
    
    
    
17. To reduce gin pole line tangle for the next use, separately wrap the lifting halyard and the auxiliary forestay before removing the gin pole. After pole removal, the gin pole stays can be wrapped as a bundle.
    
    
    
    
    
18. Bruce hefts the gin pole back to storage, ready for the next mast stepping.
    
    
    
    
    

Contact us if you'd like to learn more about Ensign sailing.