Does anyone have experience replacing lifelines? I recently ordered new vinyl covered stainless wire lines and hardware from West Marine. When they arrived, they seemed short, as I had to extend the turnbuckles on each end so only a quarter or less of the studs were in the barrels. The rigger at West Marine told me this is right...to allow for stretch over the years (3" or more on a 26' boat over 8-10 yrs). Does this sound right? I suppose I can introduce shackles at each end and remove them when the stretch gets bad.

Steve:
Thanks for the reply, and you're right about the first three or four threads holding the load. I asked a rigger at my marina about this. He said the lines would be OK as they were made, but his standard for lifelines would be to have about half the stud inside the barrel. He didn't like the idea of so much stud exposed to the elements. I passed that on to West Marine and they redid them to that spec at no extra cost. You can't beat that for customer service!

I just had all my standing rigging done at a rigging shop in Fairhaven, MA.  I removed all of the standing rigging and brought it to them.  Seemed to be the best idea.  When I picked up the new rigging and put it on the mast, It looked great.  When I raised the mast I found that the rigging was very tight and I had to have an extra hand at the backstay to get it attached.  So riggers do compensate and make the new rigging shorter to allow for stretch over the years.