Solo Retrieval -- 27" draft, MinnKota trolling motor?

[Après Vous]

Either hang yourself or trip and take a header over the side.

[Noemi - Ensenada 20]

I learned the "bungee the shrouds out of the way" trick from another TSBBer when I went sailing with him. (....King?  Hunter something?)  Works well on Anungoday.

Charles, are your mast rollers a buy-able thing, or something you made?  I'd like to see a clearer pic of those.

[Charles Brennan]

Noemi, Well . . . . . 
Like most of the stuff on Urchin, it kind of evolved, over both time and misadventure! 

In Ye Olde Pre-Digital Camera Dayes, my boat came with a forked mast stand that sat on the gudgeons and the front of the mast was simply lashed to the bow pulpit, with carpeted padding. 
It's Sole Virtue, was that it held up the aft end of the mast, but otherwise, thoroughly sucked. 
For example, the spreaders hit the stand early and the mast had to be lifted and hopped over the fork to get the mast to mount on the mast step plate, properly.
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Lashing and un-lashing from the bow pulpit got old fairly quickly, so I hit up one of the local south Florida trailer manufacturers for a winch/mast stand for a Hobie Cat, as the analog pic shows below.
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That lasted a few years, until a super low tide at Bakers Haulover ramp caused so much of a retrieval load, it trashed the Hobie mast stand. 
So I put the original winch stand back on the trailer, cut off the un-bent part of the mast stand and bolted the remainder, to the winch stand.

Fast forward a few more years, until a Key Largo sailing trip with Tom Parent ended (predictably!) in disaster and this time, the winch stand failed! 
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That was how I jury-rigged it, to get it home from the Keys.

And as is my wont, I beefed up the bejesus    out of the NEW bigger, winch stand!
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Check out the  ½-inch U-bolts on the front half of the winch stand base, as well as the hefty reinforcing straps.

This is the top part of the Hobie Cat mast stand with the vee roller and two "Y" side rollers.
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The original pipe-fork aft mast stand had pretty well rusted apart by now, so I had some right angle brackets welded to the mast stand, drilled them out, tapped them and screwed in some threaded rod and finally, had the threaded rod ends welded to make a very robust set of pintles, to fit the gudgeons on the transom.
And that whole assembly got moved to the back of the boat.
(A Thing Worth Engineering  . . . .  )
The geometry for the spreaders was good.  I could move the mast all the way aft, for the end to fit the mast step plate and not have the spreaders hit the fork.
No more "mast hopping".
My next problem, was the angle to fit the mast end into the mast step plate was too low, so I cut the tube close to the top and made an extension out of some Uni-Strut I had laying around and it was (finally), Perfect!
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At the aft end.

But now I had to fabricate something for the front end of the trailer
Bought a couple of keel roller brackets and bolted them to a 2" X 2" X 14 ga. galvanized steel square tube.
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Like so:
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Added a 6-inch cleat to facilitate single-handed snap launches and I was finally satisfied with mast storage and operation.
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Until a tough ramp I was unfamiliar with, trashed the comparatively thin Uni-Strut. 
So I got some more 2" X 2" X 14 gauge steel square tube and bolted THAT together.
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All those progressive off-sets may look Dumb, but it really facilitates mast raising.
Look closely at the two holes in the top of the mast, where the Windex gets screwed on.
I can roll the mast forward on the two fore and aft mast stand rollers, then stand on the transom and quite easily, screw the Windex on.
Then I slide the mast all the way aft, until the mast end is aligned with the mast step plate.
Prior to this, for about 30 years I had to physically lift the mast close to the mid-point and precariously carry it across the deck, while trying not to stumble on deck hatches, mast steps, cabin tops, hand rails, and coamings, etc.
Very cumbersome.
This is MUCH easier!!   

So really all you'd need is 2) pair of keel roller brackets, 2) vee rollers, two lengths of 2" X 2" X 14 ga. galvanized steel square tube and  2) 2" X 7" square U-bolts, nuts, and shackles for the winch stand.
Well, that and some hefty right angle brackets and bolts, to use as pintles.
But all in all, not a difficult DIY project.

Hope this helps,
Charles Brennan

[Après Vous]

I currently have the original(?) setup on my 5.5, and have been thinking along the same lines as your mast crutches, but hadn't considered a front roller. I'm considering making my front crutch vertical and attached to the winch stand at their intersection point, with a couple of braces lower down to act as steps in an improvised ladder, but I'm not sure that it's a practical idea. I'll have to consider it further when I get other things out of the way.

Some questions: what are the vertical distances between the top of your front roller and the foredeck, and the distance between the rear roller and the top gudgeon? Your pictures show enough headroom that I shouldn't be hitting my head when going below while on the road or doing maintenance. With the added height from the keel, I'll have to watch my overall height, but I don't go into McDonalds drive thrus anyway.

One of my chores is fixing the reported leak in the cockpit drain. I was told that there is a plastic tube between the fittings of the inner and outer hull that is the likely culprit. Any thoughts?

[Charles Brennan]

Après Vous,  As you can see from the pic, the mast is only around 6 - 8 inches above the bow pulpit, so around 2-2½  feet, above the fore deck.
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Not sure of the roller-to-upper gudgeon spacing but would estimate it as around 4 or 5 feet.
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For exact measurements, you'd have to ask the new owners!   
I suppose you COULD hit your head going below,    but I have never had a problem, since I just lean to one side of the mast or the other, to enter the cabin.  Standing down in the cabin, your head doesn't reach the mast at all.

As to your last question, my cockpit seats don't have side drains.   The cockpit drain goes down into a molded fiberglass "tube" mounted on the swing keel trunk.
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That homely hunk of fiberglass saved my life, once

Hope this helps,
Charles Brennan

[Après Vous]

Oops. Forgot that you'd sold the her.