Audasea has the open metal toe rails found on the older M17's and she came with a pair of snatch blocks to use as jib fair leads:
I have the metal toe rails as well. Very handy. I am forever changing sheeting angle and the rail makes it easy. Yes a track would be even easier but the rail works well for attaching all kinds of stuff. Spinnaker sheets etc.
http://www.westmarine.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/producte/10001/-1/ 10001/245850/0/0/snatchblock/All_2/mode+matchallpartial/0/0> You can easily move them up and down the rail as needed for each sail. Looks aside, my preference is the metal toe rails because of all those handy attachment points. I use them all the time.
Snatch blocks would be the dogs bollix. I hadn't even considered a snatch for this but what a great idea. I just use a regular 2 1/4 -ish unit on a snap shackle. It can be an interesting process moving one of these under load. Of course you can luff up or just loose the sheet to gedderdone, but sometimes the challenge is fun.
I had a turnbuckle work loose once on the road. Others galled and froze. Bottom line is I eventually replaced all 6 of them and glad I did. I would check all the rigging and all connection points on each end, replacing anything that looks suspicious. Especially so on the fore and back stays. Loosing a mast will ruin you day.
I had a complete dismasting on my other sailboat last year. All because the ring style cotter pin somehow disappeared on one of the side stays. A clevis pin worked its way loose...on the windward side..... closehauled.....like a dream. Sailing along at hull speed tweaking sails, just marveling at the beautiful, hot (windy) day and bam.....the whole thing just slowly falls over into the water. Complete with a movie-like sound effects.Thing is, something has to give. In this case, it was the mast. Spruce. Now in three major pieces. Those wires are a tiny bit important. ~:0) How the dang cotter ring came off, I will never know. I suspect a neighborhood kid thought it would be fun to play with maybe. It doesn't matter either way...I should have checked more closely when I rigged. I did adjust that turnbuckle....I wish I had just looked more closely. I can't imagine how I missed not seeing a missing cotter. Lesson learned: You can bet I check the rig every time out now. Cheers. Tim Diebert M17 'Puff' #369..... and my old gaffer 'Annie M'......currently stickless.