Neil Evans has been talking about the merits of Harken’s T2 Soft-Attach blocks—most significantly the soft Dyneema shackle as its attachment point, rather than a metal head post and shackle—when he reminds his audience of marine professionals what their biggest variable really is when it comes to deck hardware.
“With the right customer, they’re the best solution because they always find a fair lead,” Evans, Harken’s manager of technical service, says. “But it removes that metal that shows wear. You need to know your customer is going to keep an eye on maintaining that, and that it’s installed in correct applications with no sharp edges.”
It’s a subtle but critical point, and for the 20 or so riggers and industry pros who are attending Harken University at the company’s headquarters in Pewaukee, Wisconsin, it’s a reminder of why they are here—not just to learn about all things Harken, but how to best translate that knowledge and put it into action on their customers’ boats. At the same time, they can bring their questions or issues to the source and share their own experiences of helping sailors install and use the gear. Attendees in December 2023 came from as far as the Bahamas, New Orleans, and Florida.
“I’m in charge of about 125 boats in and out of the water every year and keep track of their systems and deck and mast hardware. We replace the old stuff with the new stuff,” says Erik Szymczak, head rigger at Brewer’s South Freeport Marine in Maine. “A lot of the Harken products have lasted a long time, some of them are getting into the 30-year range and it’s time to replace, and so we’re looking into the newer products.”
On the other end of the spectrum is Kelly Zander, who’s been a rigging apprentice at Crowley’s Yacht Yard in Chicago for about a year and a half and is new to the industry. “It’s great to be here, learn about the products, see how they work, see what’s out there,” she says. What’s most helpful, she says, is “all the learning, all the knowledge, how great everybody is to share their knowledge and want to teach and help and explain. The practical learning is nice, taking apart winches, playing with furlers.”
Jim Andersen, Harken’s national sales manager, says the overarching goal is “knowledge sharing between those professionals out in the field using our products and also our internal staff. It’s a lot of sharing what we do and how we manufacture our products…and also learning how we can make them better, make the jobs of installing, using, sailing with, or competing with our gear that much easier.”
The three-day gathering covers all manner of sailing gear the company produces, from blocks and hydraulics to sailhandling systems, winches, and travelers, from the basic to the highest-end and most technical. The curriculum includes technical talks and hands-on instruction—taking things apart, putting them back together—and helpful hacks and tips; did you know, for instance, that blue Dawn dishwashing liquid is arguably the go-to cleaning agent for everything except for winches and furlers? Lunches, dinners, and even a little duckpin bowling provide networking and socializing time.
A highlight is the tour of the vast, 140,000-square-foot manufacturing and assembly floor (the whole building complex, on 26 acres, is 173,000 square feet). Although Harken’s winches are made in Italy, everything else is produced in Pewaukee, and if you’re any kind of gear geek, the shop floor is a candy store. Here you can see every step in the many processes, from cutting raw aluminum into workable chunks that will be precision machined to hand-assembling blocks. For some of the Harken U participants, this can be the most eye-opening aspect.
“This is awesome learning,” says Austin McCullough, owner of A Marine Supply in Chesterfield, Michigan. “They do everything here, from the raw materials to the final product, not necessarily outsourcing stuff, they do it from start to finish and you really get to see that and experience it.”
“Going from raw material to an actual block is pretty insane, the whole process,” agrees Eva Tash, a rigger with West Marine in Newport, Rhode Island. For her work, she says, it was highly informative to see how the company creates its blocks, configures systems, works on quality control, and also has expanded their catalogue.
For McCullough, “doing a lot of e-commerce, you need to know the product you sell and how to sell it. So, learning the product, how it’s built, questions customers may ask…that is super helpful that you can learn moving forward and helping customers in the future.”
Throughout, attendees also gain insights into some of the special sauce that has made Harken gear the ubiquitous sailing presence that it is. Describing the new Zircon blocks used primarily on small boats (so far), Evans says, “I added these to my daughter’s Melges 15 she’s sailing, and the guy who trims spinnaker says it’s a day and night difference.”
Any plans, an attendee asks, to build them larger?
“Probably. We never stop,” Evans grins. “ ‘Let’s try it.’ In my world, that’s when things get fun.”
March 2024