How to move a mooring

[DaveParry]

Does anyone have any advice on moving a mooring? We have two 150lb mushroom anchors connected by about 10m of 22mm chain. We need to move them by about 10m and are planning to try to lift one end and 'swing' it around the other end. It was only laid a couple of months ago, so we do not expect it to be well sunk in yet.

Does anyone have any advice or experience on this? I am told that once the anchor is lifted it will be fairly easy to move. Winching it up might be difficult, but another option would be to attach the boat to it at low tide and let the rising tide lift it. Any thoughts?

The other sticking point, is how to get a line tied to one of the anchors without having a diver handy. I have had a suggestion of trying to 'hook' it with a kedge anchor. Anyone tried this?

Thanks for all your help.

Dave

 

[pashaka]

I use a primer and mineral powder to cover my really red nose. The problem is it rubs off really easily and exposes my red skin which is really embarrassing. How can I keep the makeup from coming off so easily? I want it to look like this is my natural nose color so ni one notices. Thanks for the help.

 

[BAtoo]

Not done it but suspect your biggest problem will be the lack of a gantry to get the initial lift off the bottom. Your bow freeboard will only be only 3ft or so and so probably not enough for the pull. Commercial outfits I have seen have a gantry several feet above the water. Using the tide may be an idea although quite slow, and you will probably only lift one at a time.

Our local yard quoted me about £100 to move a mooring a few hundred yards - seemed good value to me.......

 

[Bosun Higgs]

when we need to lift that sort of thing we use 50 gallon plastic barrels. However you have a lot more lift in your boat if you can find a way of safely attaching the lifting rope.

Try the local sub aqua club. As a tyro diver myself, its my impression that the keen divers are only too happy to find a useful task they can do and likely will not even need paying.

 

[prv]

its my impression that the keen divers are only too happy to find a useful task they can do

Certainly used to be the case, although I haven't been into diving for years. The BSAC manuals have techniques for various kinds of underwater task, which to me always made them feel like a more "serious" outfit compared to "float along in crystal blue water under a tourist dive boat" PADI

likely will not even need paying.

They're not supposed to accept any payment beyond expenses, as that would make them commercial divers and subject to much more stringent safety regulations.

Pete

 

[Trop Cher]

You have to think seriously about attempting to move this kind of weight using your boat. Consider the damage you could do to either the boat or yourself, i.e. fingers. Have you asked at the sailing club? Who laid your mooring? Try approaching a fish farm, they can often help or point you in the right direction.

 

[Csail]

Can't you get a really big boat to drag it round?

 

[BlueChip]

Does anyone have any advice on moving a mooring? We have two 150lb mushroom anchors connected by about 10m of 22mm chain. We need to move them by about 10m and are planning to try to lift one end and 'swing' it around the other end. It was only laid a couple of months ago, so we do not expect it to be well sunk in yet.

Does anyone have any advice or experience on this? I am told that once the anchor is lifted it will be fairly easy to move. Winching it up might be difficult, but another option would be to attach the boat to it at low tide and let the rising tide lift it. Any thoughts?

The other sticking point, is how to get a line tied to one of the anchors without having a diver handy. I have had a suggestion of trying to 'hook' it with a kedge anchor. Anyone tried this?

Thanks for all your help.

Dave

150lb is only the weight of one person, you'd have no worries about someone of this weight hanging from your bow, so as someone else said the eaiest way to move this anchor is to get strop to the anchor from your bow at low water and then when the tide comes in the anchor will be hanging.

The difficult bit is manouvering your boat when its tethered by the bow, so its worth rigging up some long lines to nearby moorings so you can winch yourself into the correct position with the ground chain stretched. Failing that get a couple of dinghies to act as tugs.


Once you are in position you need to release the anchor, you can wait for low water again or, and this is the tricky bit, having first made the strop fast with a short sacrifical line - cut this with a bread knife attached to the end of a boat hook. That way to stay well clear.

We used to use this technique on concrete slab moorings in Essex and it works a treat.

You can also do this by having a plank positioned across an inflatable with the ends extending beyond the tubes. The have a strop looped around each end of the plank and attach the mooring line to that or with a 50 gallong oil drum..

 

[iainbluk]

real weight of the anchors

As they are underwater, they are going to weigh less than 150 lbs, not sure by how much, but most winches would easily cope with that....think 180 lb man being winched up the mast?

 

[dylanwinter]

big job

this is how the pro's do it



http://www.keepturningleft.co.uk/scuttlebutt/scuttlebutt-62-laying-moorings/


Dylan

 

[TQA]

If it has bedded itself in mud or even sand the lifting force required to break it out will be much greater than 150 lbs.

I supose I might try and lift it with a boat but would want a sure fire failsafe method of releasing it under tension if problems arose.

 

[maxi77]

The problem I see is lifting just one anchor if the riser is connected in the middle. Unless you can get the lifting cable attachec to the anchor to be moved then you are faced with the task of moving the whole lot something which would only be easy with a craft fitted for the job. My old club had a raft constructed for that type of job.

A tidal lift would certainly do the job nice and gently which is the essence getting it out of the mud.

 

[Lakesailor]

The contractors on Windermere use a compressor with a lance attached to make the mud into a slurry around the mooring slab before lifting. The slabs weigh a great deal more than 150lbs.
Can't see an anchor would be that tricky.

 

[SAWDOC]

We did something similar recently. We attached buoyancy (in our case a pair of closely spaced catamaran hulls) to a block at low tide and near high water used a friendly fishing boat to move the reduced load to the new location. I ended up in wetsuit with knife in hand to cut the block when correctly positioned - as mentioned one has to to be well clear when the line is cut.

 

[bendyone]

As they are underwater, they are going to weigh less than 150 lbs, not sure by how much, but most winches would easily cope with that....think 180 lb man being winched up the mast?

How does that work??

 

[DaveParry]

Thanks for ideas so far...

Thanks everyone for advice and support so far. Any thoughts on the other part of the question about finding the anchor in the first place and 'hooking' it with something?

We are on the West coast of Scotland, and our mooring man doesn't make it down our way very often. We are quite a way for civilisation (diving clubs or even fish farms). There's a diver around, but he doesn't have a 'buddy' to dive with so I was trying to be as self-sufficient as I can.

Any thoughts?

 

[DaveParry]

#Bendyone - re your reply to Iainbluk. He's thinking of Archimedes (well he may not be, but you know what I mean). The anchor has a buoyancy equivalent to its displacement times the density of water. No idea what it's volume is, but every little helps.

 

[Grajan]

It is not the lifting of the anchor that is the problem although finding it might be as it could be well buried. with the anchor and chain hanging from the bow, steering will be akward as the moooring will act as a pivot point. plus you will not have the horsepower to pull the chain taught on the seabed as this is required to keep your swing to a minimum.
I would check your insurance policy before you go any further!

 

[Lakesailor]

How about starting form scratch and dropping a new mooring?

 

[William_H]

Moving mooring

A few ideas.
You do not say how deep the mooring is but I (at 65yo) can free dive down to my mooring to max about 4 metres. The trick is to pull your self down the chain from the boat. (wear gloves). Now if you pull the mooring chain up tight to the bow you will lift the chain (between the anchors) off the bottom a little. So if you can get down far enough to get a loop of rope under the chain you can then (by attaching both ends of the rope to your boat) hopefully pull the loop of rope out to the anchor which needs to be lifted and so lift just that anchor. Once you have got one anchor up it will be easy to pull that and the joining chain around to the new location. Or at least be able to pull yourself down the loop of rope to see what state the anchor is in.
Now I realise you are in Scotland so you will need a wet suit. Not a bad investment if you own a boat.

However if that is not to your liking. (As said) use the chain riser to connect to another anchor which you lay beyond the new location. Fit a new riser to the correct position on the (old riser ) chain. You lay this new anchor by having a loop of rope around it or best through a shackle in a hole in the head. Drop the anchor then pull it with your boat to stretch out the anchor as far as possible. This should mean the new anchor is on the end of a chain that is stretched as tight as possible. (it won't be tight but at least straight).

A few points however. The old riser will probably be lighter than the old joining chain so will not last as long as heavy chain. So check and or replace within a year. Any sort of anchor will be good provided it is large enough and preferably of thick dimension metal to give long life. If you have only smallish anchors then add more anchors on chains in different directions from the riser to joining chain.
You can use weights but they will be harder to move and have less grip on the bottom. However in storm if they move then the whole mooring will take up load on the original 2 mushroom anchors. So moving anchors are not usually the problem, just the integrity of chain and shackles is vital. Failure here will see your boat adrift. good luck olewill

PS if water is deep enough a sail boat can lift a lot with a bridle from one sheet winch to the other so load is under the keel. This also makes boat steering easier.