Oh My - what a drama - new swaging failure

[ribbony]

The drama is now at an end. The rigger did the honorable thing and replaced the wire and hardware, refunded us the money we paid for swaging and off we went to get the new gear swaged elsewhere on a better swaging machine. This time we had them done in a overhead press by Joe Walsh, and he did a great job, all to spec and was friendly to deal with. In hindsight we wish we had done the extra driving 6 weeks ago.

Now I have to put the new stays on the mast (the old ones are currently back on to keep things upright).

Thanks for all the support and comments, they helped us pursue a safe outcome in this case. The importers appear to have also influenced the outcome in ensuring that their product was swaged on in an acceptable manner, it is not in their interest to have their name on components that may fail. The exact question that we asked to get their attention was: "Can the manufacturer of XYZ swaged fittings state, that swaging XYZ terminals by the process proposed by the rigger (detailed below) constitutes correct procedure for the manufacturing of sailboat rigging and that there is no compromise to the structural integrity of the rig as a result of such swaged joints that will affect the safe use of, service life of, or functioning of the rig".

The lessons we have learnt from this episode are:

1/ Have fittings "press" swaged in a big machine, rotary swaging may be possible in the USA, but nobody I asked knew of them being used here in Sydney. If roller swaging is done then make sure the machine is capable of achieving correct compression on the medium and heavy wires. If you are in Oz then be wary of the roller swage machines that originate in Perth. We had problems with swages done on 2 different versions of that roller swage machines in the hands of 2 different riggers. The opinion of some riggers here is that those RS machines are for smaller diameter swaging, but not the larger stuff (we had 5/16").

2/ Have the first swage checked in your presence to make sure it is to specification, don't assume anything, take some verniers and that will also show the rigger that you are checking on the quality of the work to be done. In the end it is your safety on the line.