"Wayne.B" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 3 Jan 2006 11:34:39 -0000, "News f2s"
wrote:

I'm aware that the Oyster was about twice the displacement of
the
Beneteau, so the inertia stresses on the Beneteau rigging would
have been higher (all that bouncing around!).

=============================================

Perhaps not. The most important predictor of rigging stress is
righting moment (resistance to heeling). A boat with a higher
righting moment can carry more sail for a given wind strength,
and
consequently has higher rigging loads.

Good point. I was assuming that fatigue was the main source of
rigging failure, driven by cyclical stresses. Of course, if you're
cycling around a higher stress, that matters! I also noted that
the inner forestays were the weak points on both boats. It worked
from slack to 'twang' while pitching to windward. Not a scientific
observation, but interesting.

BTW, sorry about the senior moment - the Oyster rigging was 18 yrs
old . . .

JimB