Veering at Anchor

[BobPrell]

Thanks for any suggestions short of getting a long keeled boat.

Well done everybody for your suggestions. In my experience some of them can be expected to work or at least help some of the time. However I strongly support the observations of neilf39 and fishermantwo, and would add another problem. It is quite on the cards that a yacht can sail over its anchor rode and then be stuck with it between the keel and the rudder.

I believe veering is the great unadmitted problem with fin-keeled yachts used for cruising. It is the high bow getting in the grip of the wind that causes it, combined with the separate rudder well aft, (great for steering) so the bow swings easily and the stern does not. The stern tends to follow the bow, wherever it goes. If the rudder is left loose, the tiller will swing madly across the cockpit every cycle.

A narrow, deep keel resists sideways movement well when moving thru the water, so the yacht resists leeway well when sailing. It will not resist sideways movement nearly as well when anchored. Even a yacht with a lengthy keel, I'm talking 2/3 of waterline length, will still have the problem if the forefoot is cut away, as most are, in pursuit of lower wetted surface.

I sometimes wonder if this is why the ships of long ago persisted with stern castles. They must have lain nicely to their anchors in a wind.

 

[jimbaerselman]

Actually a Bahamian moor is one anchor up current and one down current and for most of the time you lie to one anchor.

Ooops! Thanks John, I should have said forked moor.

The Bahamian moor will also work (I used to call it a "tidal moor") but is more fiddly to implement, and confuses people no end if there's a wind shift and they're on single anchors!

I wonder how it came to be called a "Bahamian Moor" ?

 

[Salty John]

I wonder how it came to be called a "Bahamian Moor" ?

It's certainly used a lot in the Bahamas because there are many anchorages with strong reversing currents, but why that name is so widely adopted, as opposed to the more generic 'tidal moor', I don't know.

 

[KellysEye]

As suggested use a riding sail, we do and it really cuts down veering and thus the anchor snatch load. It's much easier and quicker than putting out a second anchor which is a bit of a pain but necessary in some cicumstances.

 

[rtchina]

I'd like to thank all the people who posted their suggestions. As stated, the problems are, high bow, far back rudder, fin keel and big bimini. I can't see that I can deploy a riding sail on the backstay as the bimini screws that up, its big. I think I will add another anchor. Currently I have a 25kg Delta with 50m chain and 100m warp, but I will add a 20kg fortress with a short chain and warp. I'll cynch the Fortress warp forward and drop the fortress from the stern then motor across to drop the Delta as normal. I think that's about the best I can manage as I am usually short handed and the boat is 43 ft long. HOwever, I clearly remember when working for a charter company in Greece, retrieving a 32ft yacht which had been left riding to two anchors for 4 days in a blow. It took me 3 hours of sweat and tears to untangle that one. I was a lot younger then. But overnight, should be ok.

 

[prv]

It is quite on the cards that a yacht can sail over its anchor rode and then be stuck with it between the keel and the rudder.

I can imagine that if you were to use rope, but surely chain either runs forward (if under load) or drops straight down (if temporarily unloaded).

Pete

 

[BobPrell]

I can imagine that if you were to use rope, but surely chain either runs forward (if under load) or drops straight down (if temporarily unloaded).

Pete

I have had it happen with nylon rode, which sank. The boat "sailed" with the windage of its hull, crossing the wind until the anchor rode eventually pulled it head to wind again. By this time it had built up enough speed to run forward against the wind for a few metres before "tacking". It then went over the rode.

What scared me was the thought of the rode getting jammed between the top of the spade rudder and the hull.

To be realistic, this situation may be less likely with a larger yacht. Mine was a 24' plywood sloop of 1 ton displacement.

 

[Capt Cautious]

Something I've used in the past - and use a variation today if there is a strong wind, is to move the pivot point aft. The point normally resides in the hawse pipe at anchor, but if you can do a bit of a "Baltic Moor", by securing a length of rope to the anchor chain somewhere in the first 15 ft or so, then put a little weight on it, (either by veering the cable or heaving the line) and make it fast somewhere aft of midships, the pivot point moves aft. She'll lie off the wind, and be slightly more prone to dragging as she presents more resistance - but if she's likely to break out anyway with all the yawing about then there's little to be lost. The craft will behave totally differently - I even manage a nights sleep without all the rattling and grinding (and that's just the anchor chain...)

good luck