What are all those anchors doing lying on pallets in the yard ?

I plead guilty.

Here are my reasons:

1. To ventilate the chain locker.
2. To stop the chain going manky which it will if left in a dank locker, wet and muddy, all winter.
3. To get the anchor off the deck so as to give me a better chance of cleaning and painting/ varnishing said deck.
4. The CQR is on the pallet because if you leave it on the ground it will lose the galvanising and rust where it is touching the ground.

I have just sold a boat after 30 years with chain and anchor bought by the previous owner in the 1960s in very good condition and bought a boat whose owner did not do this and whose 37 year old chain is going for scrap.

I rest my case...
 
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If you sail in Oz you can do it 365, no time for laying out chain on pallets. The only yachts stored on the hard are things like Etchells.

But leaving your chain in a damp, muddy, salt laden locker sounds like a recipe for Jimmy Green and any other chandler to smile knowing life expectancy of the chain is reducing.

Lay the chain neatly on a pallet under the hull, wash with freshwater, check the marks, wash out the locker - is it really that difficult? Is chain so cheap it does not matter?

Jonathan
 
I'm one of "them" too. I take it home and lay it out in the back yard and let Devon rain do the cleansing. My reasoning:

1 just seems right that clean freshwater-washed chain in an airy environment is better than six months unmoved in the bottom of a damp chain locker. Interestingly when I pulled it out of the locker I disturbed a winter hibernation home for flies and wasps.

2 the chain and anchor total cost is about £1600 and I don't fancy buying it back at a boat jumble in the spring.
 
JumbleDuck said:
My boat weighs 4 tonnes, of which 0.05 tonnes (1.3%) is the anchor and chain.
Click to expand...

Well, suppose COG of our boat is about 0.5m from the bow end of the keel bottom maybe, and the boat weighs about 7 tonnes. So it takes a turning moment of about 3.5 metre-tonnes to tip it down at the bow? the anchor locker is say 5 metres forward from the COG so a weight of 3.5/5=0.7 tonnes will tip it. That's a lot of chain. But if the keel is cut away more at the bow as some older ones are, that 0.5m may be less? If it's 0.1m then the weight to tip is 0.7/5=0.14 tonnes or two people. I'd be nervous wandering down to the bow in that case with the anchor locker full?

After we sold our last boat, a Maxi 100, the next owner managed to let her tip down onto her bow when drying out in Castletown (or thereabouts) - some boats are near to being bow-heavy?
 
After washing and drying (on a pallet), my chain is treated with the oil drained from the engine. Double protection!
 
JumbleDuck said:
Lots of boat in the yard with mine have their anchors on pallets on the ground. I assume that their owners believe their GRP boats will bend if loaded with an anchor over the winter, just like old wooden ones did.
Click to expand...

But surely one needs a bit of weight in the ends, to reverse out the banana bend induced during the racing season when one has had the forestay and backstay wound up uber tight?
 
garvellachs said:
Well, suppose COG of our boat is about 0.5m from the bow end of the keel bottom maybe, and the boat weighs about 7 tonnes. So it takes a turning moment of about 3.5 metre-tonnes to tip it down at the bow? the anchor locker is say 5 metres forward from the COG so a weight of 3.5/5=0.7 tonnes will tip it. That's a lot of chain. But if the keel is cut away more at the bow as some older ones are, that 0.5m may be less? If it's 0.1m then the weight to tip is 0.7/5=0.14 tonnes or two people. I'd be nervous wandering down to the bow in that case with the anchor locker full?

After we sold our last boat, a Maxi 100, the next owner managed to let her tip down onto her bow when drying out in Castletown (or thereabouts) - some boats are near to being bow-heavy?
Click to expand...

The front supports on my cradle are about 2m back from the bows, so if the CofG of the boat is 2m behind that I'd need to put 4 tonnes - roughly - of chain at the bows to tip her nose down. She's be a bit more sensitive with her legs on, since they are about 3m from the front and most sensitive of all just dried out beside a wall.
 
If you read the item " freecycling boat bits" in the reader to reader forum you will see that the reason people do it is because they put items that may be of use to someone else next to the skip rather than in it.
But leaving the chain shackled on at the skip end is a bit like those pubs where they superglue some change to the bar top to confuse the customers
 
Just a minor question:

'What are ALL those anchors doing lying on pallets in the yard'

Is this actually an accurate statement? How many actually discharge their anchor (and chain) for the winter, what does 'ALL' encompass?

Jonathan
 
Neeves said:
Just a minor question:

'What are ALL those anchors doing lying on pallets in the yard'

Is this actually an accurate statement? How many actually discharge their anchor (and chain) for the winter, what does 'ALL' encompass?
Click to expand...

"All those anchors" does not mean "all anchors", just "that curiously large number of anchors". In the yard I'm in about one in four seems to observe the ritual.
 
My chain is out in the weather for a fresh water rinse over the winter. Better that than left to fester in the chain locker. Nothing to do with weight at all. Oh, and it gives me a chance to inspect the full length of the chain, as well as replace the bitter end rope. But of course, as always, there are a number of folk around these parts who think these sorts of actions are a complete waste of time. Good job we are all different!
 
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