mooring lines...

[tritonofnor]

Moving a few boats around the marina today I noticed just how poor some mooring lines were and thought I 'd just make a few points :

Why is it that some people will spend thousands on a boat, and then spend less than a fiver on a bit of woefully inadequate polypropylene to tie it up with? They then actually look surprised when it chafes through in any sort of wind.

The next stage then seems to be buying more of the polyprop, or using old braided (non-stretchy) halyard and (not wanting to cut such a long bit) starting at one end of the boat and knitting back and forth until the boat looks like its been captured by a demented spider!

The last plea is for not putting a short rope on a motor boat centre cleat. I passed one today that was well moored apart from a 4ft length of rope going straight vertically from centre cleat to pontoon cleat taking all the load of the boat.! (needless to say it was quickly slackened off).

Can we please have a return to fore and aft lines, breast ropes too on exposed pontoons, and nice long springs that will take some shock loading? I'm sure that no-one here would be guilty of the "crimes" above, but have a look at your neighbours in case they're about to break free in this weekend's forecast weather!



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[rich]

I saw a good example last summer, 2 40ft AWB's one long line on each boat. the pontoon was well tied up but the boats were moving back and forth about 5 feet with the warps running through the cleats.
<A target="_blank" HREF=http://=http://www.jersey-harbours.com]http://www.jersey-harbours.com>http://=http://www.jersey-harbours.com]http://www.jersey-harbours.com</A><P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by rich on 18/03/2004 19:14 (server time).</FONT></P>

 

[starboard]

Could not agree more...one of my pet hates having spent most of my days working and playing with boats is poor rope-work. Just wander around my marina at Troon and look at the bits of string some people put their faith in to keep their pride and joy safe!! Not a problem to spend 50k on a boat but begrudge paying £2 a metre for some descent stuff to make it secure.....how often do you see old sheets/climbing rope etc used for this purpose...and those are the good ones!!What you will find though is a boat that is well moored with descent cordage will be owned by a descent seaman..I would take that person to sea anyday.

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[whisper]

Have to admit that I don't bother with Springs. We moor alongside a quay with about a 3 metre max. rise and fall - it dries about 2m.
We rely on long Bow & Stern lines - about 8m. long - to prevent most of the see-sawing movement that Springs are normally used for.
We also have short Breast ropes and this combination seems to work for us even though it's not what "The Book" says.

Mind you if the forecast that I've just seen looks likely to come to fruition then I think I'll double up the Bow and Stern lines tomorrow.

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