I ran a new spinn halyard last summer. Dropped a small feed line tied into a 1/4" nut through the upper starboard exit holes and fished it out the lower one with no problems... Tying a small chain (jewellry variety?) idea sounds good too....

I haven't done this on my C36, but on one or two other boats I've worked on, we used those high-power rare-earth donut magnets (the ones with a hole in the middle). They're reasonably cheap, and there shouldn't be anything magnetic in your mast for them to catch on. Try one of these: [url]http://www.amazon.com/Neodymium-Earth-Magnet-Rings-Diameter/dp/B005HYD0H...

As a teenager, one of the boats I occasionally crewed on had a particularly troublesome problem running a halyard down from the top. Instead, they ran a feed line *up* from the bottom, using a magnet tied to some lightweight string, and "pulled" up with a very strong magnet outside the mast, then tied it off at the top and pulled the line back down. I don't remember all of the details, but it was pretty cool.

[QUOTE=Chachere;17866]I've read that hanging some small chain at the end of the messenger line will both add heft and give one something to snag with a piece of wire or a small magnet.
Haven't actually ever done this myself, but its on the list of tasks for this weekend, as part of my planned first trip up the mast. Assuming I actually find the nerve to do so, I'll let you know if this works![/QUOTE]
Found the nerve to go up there today, and I can report the plan of hanging a small chain at the end of the line and using one of those "magnet on the end of an extendable wand" tools to snag it out worked great.
Nice view up there, by the way....

Glad it worked, Matthew and thanks for reporting your results.

[QUOTE=deising;18435]Glad it worked, Matthew and thanks for reporting your results.[/QUOTE]
It did work .. and here's the final result:

Wow! How beautiful.