Bent anchor!

Ian_Edwards

Ian_Edwards

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At the risk of starting another anchoring thread >>> capital offence!

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I though you guys might like to see that it's not just Rocna anchors that bend. This Spade anchor was spotted in Tobermoray this weekend. It seems it bent when recovering the anchor in a F6 in Arinagour, Coll. The boat is a Southery 32, I'm not sure if the owner contributes to this forum, but if he does I'll leave it up to him to comment further.

Cheers

Ian
 
I seem to remember some CQR's had a linking rod welded on the inside between the 'ploughshares' ?

Please let's keep this to the design talk, if it goes to 'my wotsit was cast in the finest Morrocan Vinyl so must be better than yours' I fear mass suicides...
 
Seajet said:
I seem to remember some CQR's had a linking rod welded on the inside between the 'ploughshares' ?.
Click to expand...

Um, yes, mine does. But what's that got to do with the Spade in the picture with the shank bent through 90 degrees?

Must admit I'm a bit disappointed to see it, as while I'm quite happy to stick with my inherited CQR I had identified the Spade as my preferred choice if I was ever buying a new anchor.

Pete
 
Spotted this when in Tobermory this past weekend (our boat is captured in the background of the photo!) and was really surprised how far bent it was......but strongly suspect he must have fouled it on something, cannot believe it bent so far if it was self-secured, even in Arinagour.
 
It surely must have been foul on something then unable to turn when force was applied. The maximum force I can imagine is a snatch load on a fully tautened vertical chain, with wave action bringing the boat up and down.
 
My view,for what it's worth

If you look at the design, there is very little to resist bending in the plain in which it's bent, it's essential a flat bar. If the spade was well dug in, with the plough shear well buried in the mud/clay/sand, as it's designed to do, and the boat was shearing around (which isn't unlikely, for a Southerly 32 in a F6, high topsides and not much under the water) then you could see how a large side load could be applied just before the anchor broke out.
Adding a T to the top would stiffen it up a lot, but make it more difficult to bury its self deep into the seabed. It's a design compromise.
Cheers
Ian
 
prv said:
Um, yes, mine does. But what's that got to do with the Spade in the picture with the shank bent through 90 degrees?

Must admit I'm a bit disappointed to see it, as while I'm quite happy to stick with my inherited CQR I had identified the Spade as my preferred choice if I was ever buying a new anchor.

Pete
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+1
 
Strange that it seems to be bent at the point it enters the bow roller.
Are you sure the 'bent it on the bottom' is not just the story for the insurance claim? ;-)
 
Had some friends got a bruce wedged between two rocks in Sardinia. It was in 6m of water, diving and recovering by hand was too difficult (it wouldn't budge).

They ended up motoring over it, turning and yanking it multiple times until it broke loose. Anchor was a mangled mess afterwards.

There's always a possibility of losing an anchor.
 
RupertW said:
It surely must have been foul on something then unable to turn when force was applied. The maximum force I can imagine is a snatch load on a fully tautened vertical chain, with wave action bringing the boat up and down.
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Although I declare an interest as a 'Spade Owner', I don't represent the company and am slightly baffled by some of the remarks.

If you wedge ANY anchor into a rock and apply enough force it will either break or bend dramatically.

The Spade anchor is well made and tough - the fact that someone has bent one should be making people ask questions like 'How on earth did you do that?" rather than, "It must be a ropy anchor to bend in that way..."

In my sailing career I have seen a few bent and mangled anchors. I don't condemn then just because they bent rather than broke.
 
I agree, the question should be how did that happen and can anything be learnt from it to improve the already good design. Or is this just one of those things that happen when your sailing, the anchor has clearly been load in away it wasn't designed for, but it's near on impossible to predict every possible loading scenario.

In previous incarnations I've bent one fluke of a Danforth Anchor to about 90 deg of the other, by getting it caught in (I suspect, because 20m down I could see it) rocks and then using the engine to break it free.
 
Ian_Edwards said:
If you look at the design, there is very little to resist bending in the plain in which it's bent, it's essential a flat bar. If the spade was well dug in, with the plough shear well buried in the mud/clay/sand, as it's designed to do, and the boat was shearing around (which isn't unlikely, for a Southerly 32 in a F6, high topsides and not much under the water) then you could see how a large side load could be applied just before the anchor broke out.
Adding a T to the top would stiffen it up a lot, but make it more difficult to bury its self deep into the seabed. It's a design compromise.
Cheers
Ian
Click to expand...

I think the Spade has a triangular cross section, hollow shank. At least my replica I made has. Easy to bend anchors in the right conditions.
 
That bend doesn't look right, looks like far too small a radius to have been done on the sea bed, and too far away from the body. And no twist either, unless it was jammed and bent over the top of a rock. Doesn´t look quite right somehow.
 
Ian_Edwards said:
If you look at the design, there is very little to resist bending in the plain in which it's bent, it's essential a flat bar. If the spade was well dug in, with the plough shear well buried in the mud/clay/sand, as it's designed to do, and the boat was shearing around (which isn't unlikely, for a Southerly 32 in a F6, high topsides and not much under the water) then you could see how a large side load could be applied just before the anchor broke out.
Adding a T to the top would stiffen it up a lot, but make it more difficult to bury its self deep into the seabed. It's a design compromise.
Cheers
Ian
Click to expand...
As someone else has pointed out, it isn't actually a flat bar but a triangular section. The part towards the seabed is the 'sharp bit' and I guess is designed to allow (or not discourage) the anchor ploughing itself into mud and sand as it digs in. Obviously the lateral resistance to bend isn't as high as the vertical strength, but the fact that someone has bent a Spade shank, as I have already mentioned, it just leaves me wondering how it happened? No reason to condemn the anchor - it doesn't seem to be a very common occurrence or it might have been picked up in the yachting press or on forums like this...
 
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