Mooring alongside a quay wall

[yachtcharisma]

Hi

I had to moor alongside a quay wall for the first time the other day and was puzzled what to do with my mooring ropes. I know I need to allow enough slack to let the boat fall with the tide - let us say 3m. However, other than hanging a weight on the lines I couldn't see any way to stop the boat drifting 3m away from the quay wall at high water. I remember reading that you can use very long lines, but couldn't see how this would alter the basic trigometry that if there's enough slack to let me move 3m down at low water it will also let move 3m out at high water...

And yet, when I've seen fishing boats moored alongside quays, I don't recollect them all drifting metres away from the quay at high water. Is there a simple trick I've missed? Perhaps fishing boats just have very heavy mooring lines!

Cheers
Patrick

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Sailing a Corribee
vzone.virgin.net/patrick.fox
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[hlb]

Use as long a rope as possible. For some reason the boat tends to stop near the wall most of the time. But if it does'nt. Does it realy matter?? Carefull to make both ropes about the same length or bow or stern might go out and the other end hit the wall. Whilst on the subject, who else carries a plank these days. For harbour walls with big wooden posts up them like in Pool. Have'nt used my plank in ages. Thinking of getting rid of it.

No one can force me to come here-----------
----- I'm a Volunteer!!!

Haydn

 

[steve_cronin]

Use fore and aft springs* as well then the combined weight - four mooring warps are quite heavy - plus the combined effect of the four lines tugging & surging will keep you alongside.

*Springs are lines tied to the same mooring cleats on the boat as per the fore and aft warps and led to the same mooring points ashore but this time to the ones at the opposite ends of the boat.
Steve Cronin

 

[Bergman]

It helps if you take the bow and stern lines from an outside cleat making it pull at a better angle towards the wall.

Use long lines

Make a best guess when you first moor then make fine adjustments when boat touches bottom.

Dont have the springs too tight, and make sure both springs have similar pull, one tight and one slack will tend to pull one end away from wall.

 

[LadyInBed]

It's all in the warps elasticity. You suggested a fall of 3mtrs. If the warp is say 10mtrs after a 3mtr fall the warp will stretch to about 10.5mtrs and that is assuming no cantenary (spelling?) (bow) in the warp before you start.
Thats why warps should be stretchy.

God - I wish it would stop raining!

 

[longjohnsilver]

Plank

Always on the lookout for another plank, they soon wear away with all the walking I make the crew do!!!

 

[Twister_Ken]

>Springs are lines tied to the same mooring cleats on the boat as per the fore and aft warps<

Unless you have midships spring cleats in best pukka fashion.

 

[Ohdrat]

The way I have managed this with a considerable bigger tidal dif is to take the fore and aft lines back on the boat looping them thro / around the Quay bollards/rings.. this enables onboard adjustment of lines easy.

One way to stay close to is to is to moor so there is a Quay ladder (usually metal) abreast of the boat and loop a line round this so it can slide up and down with the tide.. don't use it to hold the boat, just so you can pull the boat closer to when boarding/going ashore.

Some Quays have vertical metal bars for springs so you can stay close to even when the fore and aft lines are slack at high water.

PS taking the fore and aft lines back on board means you can cast off without anyone going ashore.

 

[Mirelle]

If you expect to dry out at LW, your mast line ashore will hold her in to the quay at HW, since it will have a weight on it anyway.

 

[Twister_Ken]

>PS taking the fore and aft lines back on board means you can cast off without anyone going ashore.<

Except that the next kind soul to come alongside will weave a half dozen over-and-unders on the bollard and trap your lines!

 

[johnsomerhausen]

In addition to the bow, stern and spring lines, one variation on Mirelle's trick is to bring the foresail halyard to the foot of the mast and get it really taut. Then attach a snatch block to the halyard with a line going to a bollard or ring on the quay and make it fast there with good tension. As the boat rides up and down with the tide, the snatch block wuill ride down and up on the halyard. This is quite useful in drying harbours as you can make the boat heel towards the quay.
john

 

[extravert]

The official answer to this is to use mooring lines and springs which are 6 times the length of the expected height difference between HW and LW. However, as in some places around UK 5 to 10 metres of tidal range occurs, this is not often possible, as not many boats will carry 4 lines of 60m length, and often small harbours are not that long anyway. Rigging your extra long lines across everyone else's is likely to get a few frowns as well.

If you are moored against a wall on your own, ie no-one rafted alongside, then some wandering around seems to be inevitable at high water, especially if there is any wind blowing you off the wall. What becomes important then is not whether you are wandering around, but might you hit anyone if you do, either a current neighbour or a new one not yet arrived.

I have been in the situation once where there was the danger of drifting into the sharp edges of a fishing boat very close next door, and that was in Scrabster harbour last summer. The solution we used, which we copied from a neighbouring boat, was to attach anchors to the fore and aft lines with shackles so that they could slide along the lines to find the low point. This was completely effective, but took a lot of fiddling around to get the lengths right. You have to be careful to have sufficient rope at low water to still have some slack so that the anchors don't slide down the ropes and into your topsides.

A few days later we were in a nearly empty Stonehaven harbour, and at HW we just let the boat drift around a bit. There's a picture of this at

http://www.xrayted.freeserve.co.uk/section3.html

at Day 27 In Stonehaven.

 

[Guest]

The planks in Poole are dangerous and I personally would noy use them again !!

I tied up on town quay as I had done loads of times before using my fenders and planks supplied on the quay and went ashore, the tide was rising and when we got back several hours later I found the boat had a bad list towards the quay,and the port side was a foot or so deeper in the water.

Thinking we had sprung a leak I started pulling up the floor panels and looking in lockers but no water ? going up on deck the list is getting worse and a few people are gathering on the quay to watch me sink.

going to the boards I noticed the hand rail was starting to buckle,I caught hold of the line securing the plank to the rail only to find that the line was as taut as a guitar string !!

I ran downstairs grabbed a bread knife and hacked through the lines securing the plank to the rail as the line parted the boat sprang back to its normal position and I breathed a sigh of relief.

Those planks are secured to the quay by chains at each end presumably to stop them being stolen, one of the chains had gotten caught on an underwater protusion and wouldnt allow the port side to rise with the tide.

If this had happened at night or had we not come back when we did who knows what might have happened, I use my own plank now !

 

[PaulJ]

I like that ! It's one of those things I wish I'd thought of

 

[PBrooks]

One trick I've used with success is to weight the fore and aft mooring lines. Allow enough slack for when the tide is out, but tie something about 2-5kg (heavy ring spanner, can of water?) onto the warp about a third down from the top of the quay, so that it holds the boat into the quay when the tide is in. Other tricks for drying out alongside in a keel boat are to lay the anchor chain (and anchor) on the side deck nearest the quay to induce a lean to the shore. Finally some drying harbours have quite a tidal flow and it's important to make sure the rudder is on the correct side to "push" you against the wall when the tide is ebbing (where it should be depends on whether you're facing up stream or down - I learnt all this at the cost of some dignity, but fortunately little else, in Caernarvon.
Best regards Paul

 

[incognito]

Presumably you want to set things up so you can go off for a good meal, or get your head down, so you don't want to have to trim things.

If you set your warps up so that all the ropes are 3 times the drop/rise expected - and if set up initially with v little tension - then simple geometry will show you that they will stretch by about 5%. 4 times the drop will stretch 3%. I leave you to figure things out beyond that.

So for an 11m boat, on a 4m drop, we might use 12m warps, which are consistent with the size of the boat. Breast ropes are out of it. Bow and stern lines will be tricky if someone else is in front and/or behind you at the quay.

As someone else said, use the outer cleats for your bow and stern lines.

 

[steve_cronin]

I never use the midships cleats as they give too short a run to spring properly AND the short run encourages snatching.

Never saw the point of them, apart from being decorative, on a boat smaller than 50ft

Steve Cronin

 

[Mirelle]

Me too.

 

[Mirelle]

Me too! I have often used a loop of warp, from shore cleat, round the mast and back ashore, but I never thought of a snatch block and halyard, which is neater and won't hang up.

 

[alex_rogers]

They're quite handy when coming alongside short-handed. With one line ashore you have complete control of how the boat lies regardless of tide or wind.