Yay wire halyards!
Hi there,
If you do an analysis of load/stretch for wire and same-strength High-Modulus (HM) rope, I believe you'll find them to perform about the same. In my experience, people have fled from wire halyards for mostly avoidable reasons. For instance, if the halyard is cut so that the wire, either bare or inside the rope, is on the winch at full hoist, then rope, winch, and wire get mangled, plus there is a very strong tendency for the halyard to leap off the winch when you are slacking. Bad. And the reason people cut halyards like this? Most likely because they don't trust that tail splice, so want to get it past the winch before the load comes on. A good splice is, of course, at around 90% efficiency,so by solving a non-existent problem, they create a real one.
As you noted, any chafing issue can be solved with appropriate fairleads. The meathooks at the sheaves cannot be prevented entirely, but they can be greatly delayed with the biggest-radius sheaves that will fit in the mast, along with a V-section for the wire to lie in, instead of the traditional notch profile. And of course the right size rope ó not so large that it will meathook soonest, not so small that it will fatigue soonest ó will make a difference.
So that leaves lightness, and HM is a clear winner here. Which is why we often use a rope-to-rope splice, with (covered) HM spliced into a fat Dacron tail. The tail has to be small enough to crowd through the masthead (unless the halyard runs aft, which buys you some extra room), and the rope is not much bigger than the same strength wire.
Fair leads,
Brion Toss
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