Kedge anchor arrangements

emandvee44

emandvee44

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What do the members recommend for a stern anchor arrangement for a 'bows to' Mediterranean moor?
The image shows what we inherited when we bought the boat, but I think the chain is too light and the rope perhaps one size too small.

I was thinking of having 25m x 8mm chain, and 50m of 14mm rope, keeping the same anchor (have to make economies somewhere)

Cheers,

Michael
 
Jimmy Green's breaking strain for 6mm is 22KNewtons - as near as dammit 22tonnes. That's quite a lot for even a 44ftr, if the chain / shckles, splices are in good condition, and you don't anticipate huge snatch loads.

Rather "mixed" views on the Britanny anchor.
http://www.ybw.com/forums/showthread.php?t=18088


I'd be tempted to buy a more resolute anchor, and keep the chain, or go to a short length of 8mm, and a new rope.
 
emandvee44 said:
What do the members recommend for a stern anchor arrangement for a 'bows to' Mediterranean moor?
The image shows what we inherited when we bought the boat, but I think the chain is too light and the rope perhaps one size too small.

I was thinking of having 25m x 8mm chain, and 50m of 14mm rope, keeping the same anchor (have to make economies somewhere)

Cheers,

Michael
Click to expand...
Whilst you don't give an indication of the size or weight of the boat, (I have to assume it's a 44' Bavaria) you should bear in mind the following factors.
1. You will be hauling in by hand - keep weights within your manual abilities, offset against this is the minimum size of rope which you find easy to handle.
2. The anchor needs to be able to cope with a wide variety of different bottoms - I'd suggest the Danforth, though great for soft sand or for mud digs in badly with either a hard bottom or much weed. Cruising Holidays use this anchor as kedge on all their charter boats. I'd look for one that is easier to stow and to launch.

Over the past 10 years I've found a 5kg Delta, with 25m of 7mm chain and 50m of 10mm Octoplait best for my 31' x 3.5 ton boat. The alternative kedge that I have is a Danforth, on similar chain/rode configuration, but that is neither as easy to launch, recover or to stow. The chain and warp are stowed in a battery box strapped to the aft cockpit floor.
I've found an aft-mounted anchor roller necessary, for effective deployment - but then I sail single-handed and the length of chain and rode barely adequate.

I'd suggest you need a heavier anchor, 6mm chain is too light and whilst 10mm Octoplait is quite strong enough its stretch might prove problematic.

Your greatest danger will be from your neighbours motoring out and getting your textile rode wrapped around their props.
 
We use a ludicrously over specced arrangement - 50m 16mm multiplait, 10m 8mm chain and a Fortress fx23. This arrangement is fairly lightweight to handle, doesn't twist and tangle when retrieved and has held our Westerley Falcon, bows to the Southern end of Khios harbour in F7-9, 3 day Northerly blow.
 
We use a Guardian G23, 5 metres of 8mm chain and up to 50 metres of 12mm rope (cheap stuff from an Italian hardware shop...). The combination holds well, as the pull is always effectively straight and is easy to recover by hand, which is the second consideration after holding power when thinking about a kedge set up. Don't forget that the depths of water you'll be dealing with are usually fairly shallow so you don't need as much chain as you might at first think to get the anchor to set properly.
 
There are two big disadvantages of bows-to, as opposed to stern-to.

The first is that it can be extremely difficult to recover your anchor when crossed by somebody else's, a very common occurrence in many ports. A heavy, tight chain lying on top of your rope warp, or anchor, really needs the assistance of a windlass to lift it. I have watched several bows-to owners in this predicament, having to either dive to get a line on the other chain, or persuade the other boat to move. It is clear that bows-to berthers get very twitchy whenever other boats prepare to lay their anchors nearby.

The second is that, should another boat's prop contact your anchor warp, the resulting damage and inconvenience will be far greater with rope than with chain. I have seen an anchor chain around a prop, which took some sorting out, but at least it was not cut, which I have seen several times.

In our case the real decider was that our boat is very difficult to board from ahead, but that may not be a factor for you. We now always berth stern-to, in the cases where there is ballast below the wall berthing further out and using the dinghy as an intermediate pontoon.
 
Thank you all for your comments and advice.
As Vyv says, berthing bows to is the least desirable option, but is necessary in some harbours. Our rudder is deep, about 1.65m, and positioned fairly well aft so we will need to take care of the ballast problem in some harbours. Our gangway is 2.45m long, although some of that length is 'lost' as the attachment point is on the vertical bulkhead of the stern.
My inclination is to keep our 10Kg. Britany, beef up the chain to 8mm and perhaps increase the rope diameter to 14mm, and then hope we do not have to use it!

Cheers,

Michael.
 
Vyv and I often differ on the subject of bows/stern to. My boat didn't do backwards . . . and I didn't have a cockpit windlass up/down control. And short handed, I liked the simplicity of just chucking the anchor off its stowage, hooked over the rail, then metering it out round the genoa winch while motoring to the quay - prop clear of other ropes. So I found other ways of dealing with stern anchors to get around the problems Vyv correctly identifies.

To avoid rope cutting, I sank the rope after arriving. First, by hooking it under a lead close to the waterline. Second, by hanging the third (otherwise redundant) anchor (a CQR) on the line as a sinker, about 5m off the boat.

To deal with heavy lifts (those wonderful bird's nests of chain and rope arising from crossed anchors) the regular deck level lead for the stern anchor was positioned to align easily with a genoa winch. I shortened the chain to 4m so that when winching I could get the anchor to the waterline before the chain hit the winch. Easier than using rolling hitches and stoppers when the chain was longer. And unbundling the mess from the waterline bathing platform was easier than working over the bow in our case.

I admit though, when chartering a boat that easily manouevres backwards, with a good up/down windlass control in the cockpit, I'm quite happy doing stern to. Even if I get a bit twitchy about my whizzing prop keeping clear of the neighbours anchor lines!
 
charles_reed said:
Quote:

Originally Posted by emandvee44

What do the members recommend for a stern anchor arrangement for a 'bows to' Mediterranean moor?
The image shows what we inherited when we bought the boat, but I think the chain is too light and the rope perhaps one size too small.

I was thinking of having 25m x 8mm chain, and 50m of 14mm rope, keeping the same anchor (have to make economies somewhere)

Cheers,

Michael

Whilst you don't give an indication of the size or weight of the boat, (I have to assume it's a 44' Bavaria) you should bear in mind the following factors.
1. You will be hauling in by hand - keep weights within your manual abilities, offset against this is the minimum size of rope which you find easy to handle.
2. The anchor needs to be able to cope with a wide variety of different bottoms - I'd suggest the Danforth, though great for soft sand or for mud digs in badly with either a hard bottom or much weed. Cruising Holidays use this anchor as kedge on all their charter boats. I'd look for one that is easier to stow and to launch.

Over the past 10 years I've found a 5kg Delta, with 25m of 7mm chain and 50m of 10mm Octoplait best for my 31' x 3.5 ton boat. The alternative kedge that I have is a Danforth, on similar chain/rode configuration, but that is neither as easy to launch, recover or to stow. The chain and warp are stowed in a battery box strapped to the aft cockpit floor.
I've found an aft-mounted anchor roller necessary, for effective deployment - but then I sail single-handed and the length of chain and rode barely adequate.

I'd suggest you need a heavier anchor, 6mm chain is too light and whilst 10mm Octoplait is quite strong enough its stretch might prove problematic.

Your greatest danger will be from your neighbours motoring out and getting your textile rode wrapped around their props.
Click to expand...




Posted from Ybw.com App for Android
 
Sorry guys. posted by accident. Sausage fingers and too smart for its own good phone!


Posted from Ybw.com App for Android [/quote]




Posted from Ybw.com App for Android
 
I would suggest that the suggestions of 25m of chain will give real problems. The only point of the chain is to keep the angle at the anchor low. I would suggest on a bav 44 that 7m of 10mm or 5 m of 12mm would be ideal. this means that most of the rode is rope and can therefore be used on a winch. As to rope size - the largest that you can get at a pinch into the self tailer. - probably 12 or 14mm. 50 metres will be needed. To stop the boat surging and clouting the bows whatever you use has to be pretty tight so winching is essential and I would go against the usual recomentation of using stretchy nylon unless you enjoy being catapulted halfway across the harbour when you release he bow. There is an ever present risk of someone picking it up with their keel, rudder or prop whether rope or chain.
 
gavin_lacey said:
I would suggest that the suggestions of 25m of chain will give real problems. The only point of the chain is to keep the angle at the anchor low. I would suggest on a bav 44 that 7m of 10mm or 5 m of 12mm would be ideal. this means that most of the rode is rope and can therefore be used on a winch. As to rope size - the largest that you can get at a pinch into the self tailer. - probably 12 or 14mm. 50 metres will be needed. To stop the boat surging and clouting the bows whatever you use has to be pretty tight so winching is essential and I would go against the usual recomentation of using stretchy nylon unless you enjoy being catapulted halfway across the harbour when you release he bow. There is an ever present risk of someone picking it up with their keel, rudder or prop whether rope or chain.
Click to expand...
Ah Gavin, you've obviously never cruised the Med single-handed (if you have you're forgetful).

Just imagine trying to handle your proposed set-up, without a winch and with no heavyweight crew aboard.

I can assure you, from considerable experience that the proposed chain-rode 25M chain and 50m 12mm rode will work perfectly well, whilst your alternative will almost certainly result in an operati0n for an inguinal hernia.
 
Charles, I'm puzzled.

His set up is surely rather lighter than your 25m of chain? And he's using a winch - presumably a genoa self tailer - which wouldn't work with chain. This sounds very similar to the set up I used, except I had only 4m of 8mm chain, and 50m of 18mm of nylon plait for the rope. That was easy single handed. My boat was 12m and 10 tons, quite heavy.

At the tension needed to cope with typical ferry wash, a part length of chain does very little for the angle of pull at the hook, so I often wondered why I bothered. A degree or two maybe. And that can be compensated by slipping the rode under a waterline level hook - or hanging a redundant CQR on the rode! The over-sized nylon ensured there wasn't too much fore and aft surge.
 
Last edited:
Thanks for drawing my attention to the fact I'd totally misread Gavin's post - in that he was suggesting virtually doing away with chain - I owe him an apology.
I find absolutely no problem in handling 25m of 7mm chain though and have been using that for 8 years.
 
Apology accepted Charles. My point is that whilst 7mm chain is fine for your 31ft boat it would be rather light for a bavaria 44. As someone who has used my bav 38 in the med for some years since sailing from the uk and only fitted an electric windlass this september I do know about the problems in hand hauling heavy chain. Using a short length of really heavy chain puts the weight where it is needed. A chum lowered a few metres down a chain may be effective in reducing shearing around but it does little to prevent breakout. My understaning of catenary calculations is that the closer to the anchor extra weight is the more effective it is. When going bows to (rare) I try to put out all my rode. The depth to length ratio is then 1:10 ish. At this ratio my 7m of 10mm chain takes quite a lot to get it off the bottom along its whole length.
 
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