mast hound angle question

[jimbo]

No apology required. I would not have read the excellent detail above if you had not bumped the thread.
I now understand why the "toggle" function is needed. ie at no stage do you really want the wire bending at the swage junction - any tendency to bend in any direction should be accommodated in the freedom of movement in a shackle or toggle thus no stress placed on the swage.
This has been niggling at the back of brain for a while now.
The X appears to have a bolt through the two tangs that form the upper hound and if the bolt was used to secure the forestay directly then swage stress can be relieved in one direction only - fore and aft rotation on the bolt - with little or no stress relief port to starboard when the forestay is under tension. A toggle or shackle is need to allow movement in the port/starboard direction.
The M forestay always needed to be secured with a shackle thus not as much of an issue with the shackle not so constraining in any direction.

[dxg4848]

Hi jimbo,

I agree with you completely. If you fix swage fitting inside the hound then swage cannot move side-to-side and stay will probably break at swage fitting. But if you use large shackle instead of hound, and 'eye' instead of swage fitting then stay can move in all directions. I think shackle + 'eye' should work better then hound + 'toggle' when attaching stay to mast.