Avoiding buoy contact on a swinging mooring

[lw395]

The solution of a light pickup buoy and letting the risers sink to the bottom works fine in shallowish water and limited tidal range, up to a certain size of chain. You can have a thick rope pendant for the last bit, like every other bit of mooring it needs to be checked from time to time. I suppose with a windlass, you could do this for a bigger boat and bigger chain etc.
I used Norfloat or Scanmarin 100 inch circumference buoys with a rod through the middle, plus a swivel on top. It was necessary to use such a big buoy, due to the weight of tackle favoured by our mooring contractor and the depth of water, about 10m at high tide. The swivel would pull up to about 6-12 inches from the stem roller.
The main problem with this was sailing schools lassoing the mooring when empty, destroying the buoy at £110 or more a time. The mooring was just too convenient in Portsmouth Harbour.
The best solution will vary from boat to boat and by location, as the chop and wind/tide will vary. I think it pays to sort your mooring out so that your boat is as steady as possible in the worst weather, less wear and tear all round.

 

[NickCharman]

If you have a sufficient overhang from your bow roller, then picking it up, and taking the weight of the buoy up under the roller will stop it touching the hull, and reduce snatching too, as the mooring will be under a steady tension. Depends on the profile of your bow/the buoy. Chain hooks are good for this task.

 

[Anonymous]

If you are talking about out of season periods when you seldom take the boat of the moorings why not detach the buoy and secure it on deck? You could easily rig up a strop or a bit of chain to make the procedure easy. The only purpose of a buoy is to raise the mooring chain/warp -- your boat will do that instead!

 

[Robin]

[ QUOTE ]
My experience in Poole is that with a mooring taken from the bottom of a buoy the see-saw action of the boat vs the buoy severed the shackles at the bottom of the buoy and the boat went walkies. I now use a soft through buoy and moor to the top so the load line is static in foul weather, and quietly carries the weight of the riser in fine.


[/ QUOTE ]

I think I described it badly but I meant that the riser chain went up from the ground chain to a swivel and the chain or rope strop went from the swivel to on board, all as a continuous unit. The large support buoy was shackled separately to the swivel and took no load at all other than the weight of the chain. A second small pickup buoy was attached to the strop. If the buoy were to be damaged the mooring would be unaffected and the boat still secure.

I have to say I never trusted buoys with rings top and bottom joined via a bar through the centre that you couldn't easily inspect and these and their swivel bits were way downsize of the heavy swivels we used at my then club. We had substantial moorings which we laid and lifted/inspected every winter as a routine of 'obligatory but voluntary mooring parties'. We never lost a boat in the 25 years I was there including during the 1987 'hurricane' due to a defective mooring up to the top swivel where the club's responsibility ended and the owner's began although sad to say one or two owner's (mainly rope ones) strops failed over that time through being undersized or from chafe or both. Poole and especially the eastern inhabited side is an exposed area in strong prevailing winds.

 

[lw395]

The buoys with rings top and bottom do require some care imho. One possibility is to turn the rod up the other way so the swivel is out of the water. One of the ones I bought had a swivel which was only held together by one nut, easily undone. I added another nut, with locktite, then drilled through it and pinned it.
Used in the water, the swivel was well worn after 3yrs use, so do keep an eye on it!
I used to capsive the buoy to check it, using an old mainsheet 4:1 tackle from the stemhead roller.
Because my boat was prone to rotate clockwise every tide, a reliable swivel was essential, so I had a well greased one above the buoy, covered with a sort of canvas hat!

 

[Graham_Wright]

Use a rigid pole instead of a line. Might rattle a bit at the fixing point on the boat but you can probably find a way around that.

 

[costelloleonardo]

Came across this thread to see if other people have issues with a mooring ball hitting your hull and for inspiration for solutions.....with no wind or current last night, no matter what line I used I ended up always next to this national park mooring buoy and it started hitting the hull very loudly. I ended up tying 4 fenders together with a long tag line and dropping it over the bouy... finally the problem was solved and I could sleep. Hope this may help some people sleep better and loose less paint off the hull.