Anchors and warp

[Island Time 1,235]

I have a Rocna 20kg, and 110m of 10mm chain. Island Time is 12.8 m Extreme length, fin keel, 5800Kg dry, about 9000 Kg max in full cruising trim. We have anchored literally 1000's of times, and worn out a few anchor winches! Mostly anchoring is easy and in good conditions. We use a scope of 3x in good conditions, 5 x in poor. We always set the anchor, using reversing momentum. The worst conditions we have anchored in have exceeded 70 Knts over the deck. We have NEVER dragged - once the ancor is set. We have dragged 2x while setting the anchor - once the anchor fouled on a rice sack, the other time was also fouled on rubbish. I have HUGE faith in this gear....

 

Anchoring is basic, yet still causes lots of boats problems. I had one drag pass me at Mahurangi the other weekend - only gusting about 15knts! Get a modern anchor, good chain, sufficient scope, then set it right, and you can sleep well!!

 

My Anchor chain has been regalved 2x. Its's now passed it's use by date, and we'll replace it soon - no money at the moment after our recent long offshore crusing stint. Off to see KM!!

[Guest]

You can regalv a few times quite fine as long as the people doing it know their game well. It's generally accepted in chainland, or at least western countries chainland, that after 2 regalvs you should really doa load check just to make sure all is still OK. We do it a lot and generally most come up fine but we have had quite a run of nasty over the last few months. Some spooky stainless fails and quite a few steel fail well below the loads they thought (and in some cases were sold it as) they had.

 

Some brand new flash stuff just last week.... or so the owner was told. Supposedly a G30 but totally failed 900kg short of the load and it had started to change shape at only 400kg, it shouldn't have done anything until at least 1600kg. It was a G20 and shitty one at that. The owner was knot amused.

 

Island Time, What you have had going on with your system is a well sorted technique. That is often the make or break of a good anchoring experience. We often see very good set-ups giving grief. A quick chat to the user and all suddenly works well

[wheels 543]

We always set the anchor, using reversing momentum.

Good point. I have been watching lately, many boaties with this really strange idea of dropping the anchor while still moving forward (and some have still been moving at a considerable speed), letting it bite in and stop the boat, then back down laying out the chain. Plain dumb idea. A real big no no when still at speed. You put waay too much load on the poor winch gear. But the big point is the anchor is now set the wrong direction, you have laid some chain forward, then you back over the anchor laying chain and back to where you want the boat to stop. They then think the boat is anchored.

Or the other often seen mistake is to release the clutch and allow an enormous pile of chain to pour over the bow. I was just saying to Grinna today, one of the best investments I made was a chain counter. Now OK, you don't Have to go this far, but. I take the depth where I am going to drop the anchor, then pay out that amount of chain. Once that amount has payed out, I then start to back down, continuing to pay out chain. Every few metres I move back, I stop paying out and allow the anchor to bite in. Then continue to back down paying out. Stop paying out again, let chain pull slightly, then pay out. I keep doing that till I reach the point I want to have the boat fall back to and then I am done. If in extreme cases, like I know the wind is really going to come up or already has, I have often pulled back real hard to ensure the anchor is well set. I have never ever dragged and if anything, I sometimes have difficulty trying to get the anchor back out of the bottom.

Actually while I am at it. The other big issue we see is those that have the idea that they can just put their foot on the winch switch and haul away. Another comment I made today was about winch power. I am amazed at how many people think their winch model number is relating to it's pull power. For example, lets say it is a blah blah 1000.that does not mean it pulls 1000Kg. It means the motor is 1000W. NEVER pull the boat to the anchor. Motor forward while winching in. If you hear the load come on when the anchor is stuck in the bottom, watch the bow. It will drop slightly. As it come to the bottom of the drop, stop winching and let the bow rise under it's own bouyancy. That should lift the anchor out. If it doesn't, drive forward.

[DrWatson 375]

I'm interested in is how to reduce sailing around on the anchor. I find it useful to have some of the chain still off the bottom, so that the chain has to drag around for the boat to move. And a boom tent halps stabilise the boat as well (more windage aft).

 

 

Having spent most of my time in small and light boats, this is something which always irritates the hell out of me. During windy, gusty nights, that whole roaring around the anchorage while firmly anchored thing is definitely a pain in the arse.

 

Something I played with this year at the barrier was to increase the effective lateral plane forward of the centre of resistance. You could do it with a forward dagger board, or an oar lashed to the pulpit, blade in the water. I chucked a bucket in the drink tied to the pulpit. It only banged on the hull a couple of times before settling to a position between the stem and the warp, and it quite effectively slowed the rate at which the bow swung, meaning the boat sat into the wind more easily. I also tried tying it around the warp just at water level with a rolling hitch so it damps the movement there, but made sure i had a knife in the anchor locker should it get messy and i had to clear it in a hurry to enable rapid anchor retrieval.

 

removing your rudder would also help you to sit at anchor more comfortably, but it's a little extreme

[Megwyn 2]

 

removing your rudder would also help you to sit at anchor more comfortably, but it's a little extreme

 

Interesting.

We have been experimenting with rudder up and rudder down, and have found if we are in enough water to leave the rudder half in the box (this fixes it forward to back so it does not move), we don't sail around as much.

 

Will have to try the centreboard idea, see if that helps. Himself always puts a half bridle on the sexy beast, even if only stopping for an hour or so, just so the warp doesn't rub on the bob-stay.

 

Like Pulse, RO is perfectly capable of at least 2 full 360's within a minute, depending on tide and wind conditions. The motion has actually never bothered me, I find it helps with sleeping, but other anchorage users are perfectly unaware of our ability to swing a full 360 while they sit nice and steady on the water.

[DrWatson 375]

I have no idea how my suggestions would work on a multi. There's a factor of two that i hadn't considered there...

 

The pope might know... he lost his rudder long ago ...

[wheels 543]

I made a snubber bridle. I take the snubber to a Bollard cleat I have part way back from the bow on each side. So it is two snubber lines from the chain to the side of the boat back from the bow. When the boat lays off to one direction, the snubber the opposite side takes the tension and while it does not stop the boat completely, it certainly reduces the boat wandering around. But to be honest, because of the weight of my boat, maybe it is a factor of that rather than me sailing around on anchor. So I guess someone with a light weight boat needs to try it and report if it works or not.

A mizzen hoisted or partly hoisted also works, but I have never tried it due to the fact that when a boat my size has an issue, the wind is too strong for me to want to create even more windage for the anchor to be holding.

[Guest]

I hang a bucket off the transom to stop her sailing on anchor in everything but above 20kts. On about 1m of string, any longer and you get a bit of a lurch when it goes tight, oh and center the tiller and tie it off there. Works ok on small light yachts.

 

If its over 20 kts I'm probably looking for a new anchorage anyway unless its blowing dogs off chains then its unlikely I'll find somewhere better.

[smithy09 50]

I'm interested in is how to reduce sailing around on the anchor. I find it useful to have some of the chain still off the bottom, so that the chain has to drag around for the boat to move. And a boom tent halps stabilise the boat as well (more windage aft).

 

 

Having spent most of my time in small and light boats, this is something which always irritates the hell out of me. During windy, gusty nights, that whole roaring around the anchorage while firmly anchored thing is definitely a pain in the arse.

 

Something I played with this year at the barrier was to increase the effective lateral plane forward of the centre of resistance. You could do it with a forward dagger board, or an oar lashed to the pulpit, blade in the water. I chucked a bucket in the drink tied to the pulpit. It only banged on the hull a couple of times before settling to a position between the stem and the warp, and it quite effectively slowed the rate at which the bow swung, meaning the boat sat into the wind more easily. I also tried tying it around the warp just at water level with a rolling hitch so it damps the movement there, but made sure i had a knife in the anchor locker should it get messy and i had to clear it in a hurry to enable rapid anchor retrieval.

 

removing your rudder would also help you to sit at anchor more comfortably, but it's a little extreme

 

Must try that. Bit hard to remove the rudder but I gave it my best shot the other week..

[rigger 47]

You could have more success with a bigger rock and more speed

[Megwyn 2]

You could have more success with a bigger rock and more speed

 

Ouch Rigger.

[Guest]

AND the best thing about buying Manson is that its the last anchor manufactured in NZ and the only anchor company that sponsors any forms of sailing in NZ...not that I'm biased though

[smithy09 50]

You could have more success with a bigger rock and more speed

 

I'm sure mate!! I was half expecting a 150mm hole in the stern and thinking "How will I plug that??

[rigger 47]

Take a look at these:

Auto pilot engaged - no one on the bridge...... Next minute....

[wheels 543]

Ouch!! What did it hit?? and what does that look like??

[rigger 47]

Oil platform - apparently the ships master was in his cabin asleep and ended up on left the platform when the vessel backed off - He was injured.

Do not know how the platform faired

[Jon 360]

Luck no one was on the bridge

They may have been hurt

[smithy09 50]

Hahaha. I bet he woke up rather quickly!!

[sow1ld 2]

Um theres nothing wrong with dropping the anchor and driving it in frontwards. Its particularly useful when stern lining in on boats that won't go backwards nicely (cav 32 etc with fixed 3blade props) u line up the tree you want to stern line around drive in snub the anchor off when it bites in the sten swings around and faces the tree you wanted. Theres very little backing or sideways backing required. It can make life much easier than the standard method

[Island Time 1,235]

Agreed. I do that sometimes as well - going downwind - throttle off, drifiting fwd at a couple of knots, drop anchor, pay out warp required, let the boats momentum set the anchor. all good! Usually do give it a good tug backwards in reverse to be sure, unless it bit really well and I know its in!