Fore & Aft Mooring - How does it all go together - Ropes & Chains etc?

mark_turner

mark_turner

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I have been trailer sailing for quite a few years now BUT from this season, for the first time, have a mooring on the River Hamble.

I have just had two concrete sinkers, each with a riser chain and bouy on top, put down for me. I was asked whether I wanted a grab bouy and pick up lines etc put onto the bouys but, as I always tend to worry about escalating prices, I said I'd sort that out (perhaps too hastily in hindsight).

Over Easter I went out in the dinghy to have a look at my new mooring and began to worry about it all.

Anyway, looking at adjacent moorings, it seems that they have a mooring line somehow attached to each riser (tide was too high to pull up the mooring bouys to see how they were attached). These are joined together with a length of line with a bit of chain mid way and grab bouy connected off of this chain.

Questions are: Is this the best arrangement? how long should the mooring ropes be Should and should there be one or two at each end of the boat? How long should the rope/cahin that joins the two ends be (my two mooring bouys seem a remarkably long way apart but I guess they will pull closer together?). How/where do I join to the riser chains? What size rope/chain etc? Is there a diagram or anything that might show the various components I'd need that I could get hold of?

Incidentally my boat is a Westerly Warwick (21ft bilge keeler).

Thanks
 
I use a single chain from the ground weight through the 1st mooring bouy. The chain is attached to the main bouy with a shackle. There is then about 3 metres of chain followed by a rope that attaches to the pickup bouy. This means that I can bring the chain onto the deck of the yacht without having the full weight of the chain on the boat.
 
On a trot of Fore & Aft buoys, a rope (10mm line) between the two buoys stops the buoys spreading further apart when you go away sailing and your neighbors haven't.
This line acts as a pickup line, either with a mid line pickup buoy or with just a boat hook on your return. An added facility is that you can tie off your mooring lines to the pickup line so that on your return the mooring lines have not sunk or drifted off down stream making then difficult to retrieve.
I use two Fore and two Aft mooring lines, belt and bracers approach. They are attached to the eye ring at the top of the buoys by looping the mooring line back through an eye splice that I put in the end of each line. Doing it that way makes for ease of maintenance.
 
First off, you need to know how long the mooring is, mine for example is 30 ft, my previous fore and aft (trots) was 50ft.

The general idea is that your strops should be a length that will maintain the length of the fore and aft, i.e. if yours is 30ft and the boat 21ft then the strops should make up the 9ft gap. But, before you build four 4.5ft strops remember the angles to the hull and distance to the cleats and a 'little bit' so they are not bar tight creating an almost impossible pick up during strong current flow.

I would guess in the above example of 30ft fore and aft, your strops should be around 6ft long. This is a guesstimate and the beam of your boat at the stern maybe wider than I suspect, thus longer aft strops may be needed. I have 10ft strops for a 26ft boat in a 30ft trot, but my beam is 14ft.

The strops should be tied together with a light line which is long enough to go from your fore cleat, around the outside of the boat to the aft cleat on the opposite side to which you are leaving. This line should tie the pairs of strops together while still on the cleats, so that when you throw the mooring strops they release free but are tied together. In the centre of this line you should attach a pick-up buoy, which on your return will have both your fore and aft strops attached ready, lift and pull in the end opposite to your direction or current. For example this is usually the aft end, thus you pull up the aft strops first and loop them over the aft cleat stopping the boat, you can then walk forward slipping the pick-up line through your hands and you should be at the bow with your fore strops ready to go over the forward cleat.

A handy reminder to your bow man with the boat hook, do not be too quick to grab the pick-up line, if they grab it before the centre buoy you will be stopped short and end up spinning the boat and needing to abort the run. Request they stay patient and wait almost until the bow reaches the fore strops, they pick-up the line and you then move to the side and with another hook or leaning over the side pull in the aft strops, this is very slick and the boat should be tethered in seconds with a little practice.

Once you have the the boat stopped and semi-secure, you can then split the aft strops across your stern and tidy the fore. Many people hang the pick up buoy on the guard wire to stop it banging against the hull which it tends to do.

I do the above method when going away from the mooring for long periods. For shorter sails / weekend breaks I do not use a pick-up buoy. Instead we have the pick-up line split in two and slightly shorter, this is used as an extension fore and aft to leave our hard dinghy in the centre of the mooring. When on the mooring we basically have the dinghy rafted against us, this makes for much easier loading and getting on board.

If you do go for this, it is much more imperative that your bow man does not pick up the aft line from the dinghy as you approach on your return. The helm gently nudges the dinghy out of the way and the bow man picks up the fore strop, the helm then pulls in the aft which is much easier as the dinghy holds the strops out of the water sort of.

The chain you have seen may have been put there to sink the ropes??

Personally I use floating lines including the pick-up to try to keep them away from the turny things - not always successfull with cat props.

Hope some of this is useful.

J
 
Re: Fore & Aft Mooring - How does it all go together - Ropes & Chains

Dog watch seems to have pretty much explained it all. I use a swing mooring but some comments may be applicable.
If you use a hard dinghy you need to provide lots of gunwhale padding like a heavy rope lashed around gunwhale so you are not shy to hit the dinghy when approaching. In my case I use the dinghy on a long painter as a pickup buoy. You will need to ensure the dinghy stays withing the limits of the mooring buoys however. So tether from the middle of the joining rope.
In fitting a permanent rope between the buoys you will then not be able to move your boat across between the buoys. so you will moor with the permanent line either to port or starboard. I don't know if you will be able to moor bow into the tide or wind each time ie random asto which way the bow points. If that is ok then the bow man will always pick up the upstream end of the rope and attach with the stern attached when you pull the stern around on the joining rope.
For departure if you like sailing away (no motor) then you may need a disconnect in the joining ropes so you can swap from one side to the other so you can sail away in the prefered direction. When sailing away use your jib backed to get a positive turn away from the mooring
Good luck you will have some fun and possibe frustrations for a while just think about each approach and departure for a moment before committing.
olewill
 
Re: Fore & Aft Mooring - How does it all go together - Ropes & Chains etc?

THANKS for all the excellent advice.

A couple of points to note:

The mooring bouys that I am fixing to are have not got rings on top so I think I must fix them to the chains under the bouys.

I will probably put rope stops for the mooring lines (rather than chain).


Things I am still not sure about:

Do I use 14mm rope and if so what material?
Do I splice mooring strops over a galvanised thimble and then fix them to the riser chain using a galvanised shackle with a monel wire mousing and the thread of the shackle bashed to stop it coming undone?
Should there be a swivel on the riser and if so will I connect the mooring strops or below it?
Would it be best to have two strops forward and two aft and to connect each to the riser chain separately so that, should one shackle or strop fail, I remain attached to the riser?

Thanks
 
Re: Fore & Aft Mooring - How does it all go together - Ropes & Chains etc?

[ QUOTE ]

Do I use 14mm rope and if so what material?

[/ QUOTE ]

I was reccomended to use nylon mooring bridles by my club - apparently less likely to be affected by UV. As for diameter - this depends on the size of your boat. I have got 12mm, as reccomended for mooring location/size of boat.

[ QUOTE ]

Do I splice mooring strops over a galvanised thimble and then fix them to the riser chain using a galvanised shackle with a monel wire mousing and the thread of the shackle bashed to stop it coming undone?


[/ QUOTE ]

I am going to splice my bridles on to galvanised thimbles and then shackle them on to the riser chain - without the thimble the rope will almost definitely wear through. See thread for more discussion on how to secure.

[ QUOTE ]

Would it be best to have two strops forward and two aft and to connect each to the riser chain separately so that, should one shackle or strop fail, I remain attached to the riser?


[/ QUOTE ]

I am going to just to be sure. It should hopefully hold the boat more securely and keep it in line better. Some insurance companies insist on two bridles anyway.

Hope this helps.

Jonathan.
 
Re: Fore & Aft Mooring - How does it all go together - Ropes & Chains etc?

None of the trots I have ever used have had swivels, not really necessary as the boat is not swinging around the chain all day.

As answered concerning strop size, depends on factors such as current, shelter, cleat size, how well you sleep at night. See what others around you are using. Many people add pieces of hose pipe to strops at wear points, I have never done this but it seems about 50-50 split.

I use large bow shackles - Always Locked with monel wire. One shackle per strop to give redundancy. Mine are on top of the buoys so not wet 100% or the time. On one pair of strops, only for the fact it was all I could get on the day, I have nylon thimbles which have no wear at all. If I was setting up for a submerged joint I would use nylon, it does not rust and seems harder wearing than steel in this application.

I have loops sliced at the other ends of the strops, the loop is sized to slip through the hole in the centre of the cleat and back over the top, this stops them ever accidentally falling off.

We have 2 each end, I would not use less. Through winter I add a third strop each end for that extra confidence.
 
Re: Fore & Aft Mooring - How does it all go together - Ropes &

The si8ze of the mooring rope is very much dependant on the size of the cleats on the boat. There is no point in very heavy rope on a tiny cleat as it just won't sit right stay on. Don't be afraid of lighter ropes they will be strong enough (use hose pipe over them to minimise chafe. olewill
 
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