Swinging mooring - Single handed

[Daydream believer]

Made my own from an old danbouy. Perfect, nose the bow up to it and lift it aboard with ease. I've got an old Primrose Moody with a very high flared bow, couldn't manage any other way single handed. The Treharne version looks good a bit pricey compared to a cheap Jimmy Green danbouy.

Only problem with picking up any buoy from the bow SH is being able to see that you are on it then gettting out of the cockpit. Rushing along the deck without tripping( do not believe that “stroll” b…x ) get past the shrouds then grab the boat hook & get the pick up line before the bow drifts off.if you miss it you have to get back past the shrouds and if you have one of those silly tents then past that as well then in to the cockpit . Get to the throttle or sheet in the sails to gather way. Miss other boats . Shout F .. it & have another go I was given a mooring right in front of the club years ago . I felt privileged until I found it was so those on the club balcony could sit with their pints watching me mess it up. They did not know that 10 years in a Stella on the Crouch makes one a dab hand at it with zero room for mistakes. It was the best training ground ever

 

[seeSimon]

You are the worse type of visitor. Quite happy to damage the mooring and complain about the price. Typical

Read my post properly sm@rt @rse.

 

[oilybilge]

I end up standing on the cockpit seat, one foot on the tiller, craning my neck to see the buoy. I pop the engine into neutral with ten feet still to go and -- assuming I've judged the current correctly -- come to a halt with the bow over the buoy. I usually get it right. One tip is to judge your speed by looking sidewise at other boats and the land beyond, not forwards.

Of course it helps that she's a heavy, long-keeled old boat which keeps her course, not one of these modern bath toys.

 

[HunterWanderer]

You are the worse type of visitor. Quite happy to damage the mooring and complain about the price. Typical

Surely a line with a small chain (6mm) won't damage the buoy line ? However could that occur?

 

[ProDave]

Minute 2.20 - 2.40

Ah wouldn't it be lovely is after a sail you go back to your mooring and it is dead calm, the sea is flat there is no wind or no tide and your boat just sits still next to the mooring bouy waiting for you to pick it up.

Occasionally I sail with a friend and my experience more often than not is he motors up to the bouy while I go forward to hook it. the waves are such that the bow is rising up and down, when down it's nearly in the water, when up, the boat hook does not reach the water. So you have to time your fishing with the hook as the bow does down and grab it such it remains caught as the bow goes back up. With no motor or no steering you would not remain within reach of the bouy for more than a couple of seconds.

And this is not in a storm, just normal when there is a brisk wind.

 

[dunedin]

Read my post properly sm@rt @rse.

You said you dropped a rope with chain insert around other people’s mooring buoys.
Many mooring owners have been on here raising concerns about the technique of using a rope to lasso a buoy, but you have upped the ante substantially by adding chain.
Have you checked that the mooring owners are happy with your approach

(And no need to be rude to the poster who made a valid point.)

 

[johnalison]

Ah wouldn't it be lovely is after a sail you go back to your mooring and it is dead calm, the sea is flat there is no wind or no tide and your boat just sits still next to the mooring bouy waiting for you to pick it up.

Occasionally I sail with a friend and my experience more often than not is he motors up to the bouy while I go forward to hook it. the waves are such that the bow is rising up and down, when down it's nearly in the water, when up, the boat hook does not reach the water. So you have to time your fishing with the hook as the bow does down and grab it such it remains caught as the bow goes back up. With no motor or no steering you would not remain within reach of the bouy for more than a couple of seconds.

And this is not in a storm, just normal when there is a brisk wind.

That’s the whole point of doing it from amidships or the cockpit. From there you have less freeboard and much less motion. One is so accustomed to berthing and other operations from the bow that it takes an effort of will to realise that this is seldom the easiest way of approaching a buoy, and I confess that it took me the best part of forty years to work it out, but once we started doing it that way it all became much more relaxing. Not always for my wife, who sometimes had to lie on the side deck to thread a line through a ring, but there was less chance of getting it wrong.

 

[seeSimon]

You said you dropped a rope with chain insert around other people’s mooring buoys.
Many mooring owners have been on here raising concerns about the technique of using a rope to lasso a buoy, but you have upped the ante substantially by adding chain.
Have you checked that the mooring owners are happy with your approach

(And no need to be rude to the poster who made a valid point.)

Yes. Chain on chain.
My 6mm chain on a harbour authorities commercially offered, purpose laid "visitors mooring" I think their risers are >10mm?...like I said in my OP.

This temporarily, while I struggle singlehandedly (and, imho, totally unnecessarily) to connect to the harbour authorities buoy.

I'm not referring to other boat owners, personal private moorings.
The moorings to which I referred are offered for rent, by the night, and in this area at about £30 a night.

Happier now? Or do I need to try to clarify further?

...and if insults are unwanted, try to "do as you would be done by" please. At least read and try to understand the OP?
Although I am aware that the unwanted comments were supported by you, and not your own post.

 

[Daydream believer]

Read my post properly sm@rt @rse.

Did you complain about no pickup buoy?
Did you complain about price?
Did you lasso buoys with lumps of chain?
So tell me where I was wrong before you sink to insults
I lay mooring for the last 20 years and have seen the damage done by amateur Roy Rogers
I have also learned how to pick up a buoy. Under sail. One had to with a Stuart turner inboard Back in the 70s Perhaps you should give it a go some time

 

[seeSimon]

Did you complain about no pickup buoy?
Did you complain about price?
Did you lasso buoys with lumps of chain?
So tell me where I was wrong before you sink to insults
I lay mooring for the last 20 years and have seen the damage done by amateur Roy Rogers
I have also learned how to pick up a buoy. Under sail. One had to with a Stuart turner inboard Back in the 70s Perhaps you should give it a go some time

I've tried to explain.
I'm sorry it's so difficult for you to understand.

I find your posts insulting too.

Therefore, I give up...we'll have to agree to disagree.

 

[Chiara’s slave]

Only problem with picking up any buoy from the bow SH is being able to see that you are on it then gettting out of the cockpit. Rushing along the deck without tripping( do not believe that “stroll” b…x ) get past the shrouds then grab the boat hook & get the pick up line before the bow drifts off.if you miss it you have to get back past the shrouds and if you have one of those silly tents then past that as well then in to the cockpit . Get to the throttle or sheet in the sails to gather way. Miss other boats . Shout F .. it & have another go I was given a mooring right in front of the club years ago . I felt privileged until I found it was so those on the club balcony could sit with their pints watching me mess it up. They did not know that 10 years in a Stella on the Crouch makes one a dab hand at it with zero room for mistakes. It was the best training ground ever

Even though our boats are the same length, give or take, our cockpit is further forward, and my pickup point, at the front beam, is 10ft further aft than your bow. Plus I have 8ft wide side decks with almost nothing in the way.. on the other hand, I’d bet my bow blows off even quicker than yours

 

[Daydream believer]

Even though our boats are the same length, give or take, our cockpit is further forward, and my pickup point, at the front beam, is 10ft further aft than your bow. Plus I have 8ft wide side decks with almost nothing in the way.. on the other hand, I’d bet my bow blows off even quicker than

 

[Koeketiene]

Ah wouldn't it be lovely is after a sail you go back to your mooring and it is dead calm, the sea is flat there is no wind or no tide and your boat just sits still next to the mooring bouy waiting for you to pick it up.

Occasionally I sail with a friend and my experience more often than not is he motors up to the bouy while I go forward to hook it. the waves are such that the bow is rising up and down, when down it's nearly in the water, when up, the boat hook does not reach the water. So you have to time your fishing with the hook as the bow does down and grab it such it remains caught as the bow goes back up. With no motor or no steering you would not remain within reach of the bouy for more than a couple of seconds.

And this is not in a storm, just normal when there is a brisk wind.

Sounds like a poorly chosen spot for a mooring to me.

 

[Daydream believer]

In all fairness some people have to take what they can get

 

[Chiara’s slave]

Sounds like a poorly chosen spot for a mooring to me.

Our club moorings are like that. A challenge, particularly in NE winds. Sometimes you take what is on offer

 

[ProDave]

Sounds like a poorly chosen spot for a mooring to me.

As above all that is available near here if you must keep a boat on a mooring.

My own boat is bilge keel and kept on a pontoon in a sheltered well protected drying harbour. Having only half tide access is a small price to pay for being able to sleep at night when the wind is blowing without worrying where your boat will be in the morning.

 

[Chiara’s slave]

As above all that is available near here if you must keep a boat on a mooring.

My own boat is bilge keel and kept on a pontoon in a sheltered well protected drying harbour. Having only half tide access is a small price to pay for being able to sleep at night when the wind is blowing without worrying where your boat will be in the morning.

There is that. Insurance companies take a similar view. They’re perfectly happy to give us 12 months in commission, on a pontoon up a river, but only 6 months if we were permanently on a swinging mooring in the Solent. We only use that occasionally on our Dragonfly, if we need to pop into the club for anything, post race prizegiving or something. Or if we’re too late for the last bridge opening and the weather is set fair. The other day I picked one up on my own as Mrs C was in an exercise class, and the bridge timings didn’t work for us. Permanently, no, thank you.

 

[doug748]

I don't do it often but rarely easily.
I usually reverse up to the buoy then throw a line over but last time the rope was dry and slid off the top. Worked the second time.
The buoy also had a longish pickup line so worried about rope round prop.

I don't think the lasso method causes much harm if used as you suggest but I don't like it much. It needs a bit of skill, wind affects your throw and, if the buoy nestles against the topsides, it becomes almost impossible. If there is a pickup line I would use it and only reverse up to a buoy if a gale was blowing and nothing else worked.

I have found a shepherd's crook type of boat hook best for grabbing pick up lines as a singlehander:



You are also less likely to get it stuck if you overcook things and have to go past the mooring in a press of weather. The type on the right is designed to get stuck esp to rings and shackles - take a saw to it.

With low windage, relatively heavy, long keel or skeg boats you stand a chance of just mooching up to the buoy and walking forward; as they tend to dwell. With low freeboard you may be able to have a bight of line handy, bend down and thread it, if needed. This makes it a one part process, no boathook involved.

Lighter high windage fin and skegless boats are more fickle, less likely to ghost forward at low speed and more difficult to judge. As the others have said above, aim to put the shoulder of the boat uptide/wind then, if the approach is less than perfect, the buoy itself is holding the bow up - at least for a moment.

.

.

 

[Chiara’s slave]

Strikes me from all this is that it’s a damn sight easier if your boat has 3 shoulders