Your longest rope on the boat

[geem]

Following on from another thread and resisting the urged to create "Fred drift", what's the longest rope you have onboard and what's its for?
I will start off with my 100 metres of 19mm nylon braid on braid. It was originally for the parachute anchor off my last boat. I have never used it. It weighs a ton. But I can't part with it. One day it will come in useful

 

[Chiara’s slave]

As the instigator of the thread stretch, I suppose I need to confess that the longest rope on our boat is the main halyard, at 32 metres. 8mm Dyneema, so in fact very little stretch.

 

[KeelsonGraham]

35 metres. Ready for Polperro

 

[bikedaft]

200m x 12mm. Hope not to use it...

 

[johnalison]

50 metres of nylon. I bought it back in the ‘70s when we had a 22’ boat, but I’ve no idea what for. I have used it a few times when rafted outside lots of boats, and once in the little harbour at Vinga when I needed to warp myself across the harbour for some reason that seemed important at the time.

 

[RunAgroundHard]

About 300’ of 1” mutiplait for towline purposes or stupid anchor depths. It has a hard eye one end, to be honest not sure what material it is made from, probably nylon.

 

[dunedin]

60m of 6mm - used as runner when removing any halyards (less likely to jam at edges of sheaves than thinner rope) - and more recently for kids first attempts at solo rowing (tied to boat, not kids).

PS. longest item is not rope but the anchor chain - 86m, plus 20m rope.

 

[Supertramp]

45m of braid on braid 16mm for extreme mooring or towing, never used.

About the same length and size octoplait kedge or main anchor line.

Very tempted to construct reels to hold both these so they are kept ready for use. The moment you need them is when you least want to excavate them. Although your boat starts to resemble a fishing boat rather than a yacht!

 

[capnsensible]

We carried a drum of 12mm 3 strand. 100m. I spliced a hard eye in the free end for use with either a drogue, towing or spare anchor if required on out transatlantic tootles.

Used it once! Was in a rather stormy small anchorage in Flores, Azores.,

Eventually I unwound it all and made some varying length docklines for our liveaboard yacht but kept about 20m with the hard eye on the drum. Just in case.

 

[geem]

45m of braid on braid 16mm for extreme mooring or towing, never used.

About the same length and size octoplait kedge or main anchor line.

Very tempted to construct reels to hold both these so they are kept ready for use. The moment you need them is when you least want to excavate them. Although your boat starts to resemble a fishing boat rather than a yacht!

I also have 50 metres of 1' octiplat for anchoring but rarely used that either. Maybe I need to offload some weight. I suppose the 120 metres of JSD also counts at long rope!

 

[westhinder]

65 metres of 14(?) mm nylon with a hard eye spliced at one end, to be used as anchor rode for second anchor, or towing line or any other emergencies. So far not used, but one day it will be.

 

[Sybarite]

2 X 50m just in case...

 

[Boathook]

35 metres. Ready for Polperro

That will be 2 metres to short !

 

[zoidberg]

100 metres of 10mm Dyneema; the 'business end' of a Jordan Series Drogue.

 

[Neeves]

The diameter of the rope and its length will be dictated in part by the size, and weight of yacht.

We had 40m of 12mm 3 ply nylon as the major length of our second rode ( + 15m of 6mm HT chain). Our longest halyards 55m each, both 10mm dyneema. We had 2 x 30m 10mm kermantle snubbers and 2 spares, same length but 12mm (which we also use as shore lines or could use for towing). On a typical 3 month cruise we would use them all at some time or other. We did not carry spare halyards but could use (never had to) the screecher sheets, 10mm dyneema as halyards.

We had a cavernous 'bow' locker (just forward of the mast so under the bridge deck) that accepted 6 stacked milk crates, 2 piles of 3 each. Spare cordage was stored in the crates, along with mooring lines. The locker also swallowed a 200l diesel tank, moulded round the mast base, 'spare' anchors, shackles, chain (75m x 6mm HT) locker and windlass (the latter was 'under' the deck. We also carried a few metres of 8mm chain (our old rode) to wrap round rocks for shore lines.

We used the pair of snubbers every time we anchored, often deployed 2 anchors in a fork and slightly less frequently set up shore lines. You don't realise how little useful rope you carry - until you need shore lines (we also had a 'spare' stern bridle for a single stern shore line attached to each transom using the stern bridle. We never used the spare snubbers as a bridle but 'built' upto carrying spares having broken a bridle arm twice - you learn by your omissions).

An advantage of milk crates is that they are self draining, you can coil rope into the crate, needs patience, and house any iron mongery in the hole developed within the coils of rope or actually attached to the crate.

Aluminium Spade anchor and spare rode 40m x 12mm 3 ply + chain - ready on the foredeck 'just in case')


Jonathan

 

[Chiara’s slave]

The diameter of the rope and its length will be dictated in part by the size, and weight of yacht.

W

Jonathan

And the ambitions of the skipper and crew. When you weigh 2 tons, and might shoot over to Cherbourg for lunch, or cruise the scillies in Summer, you don’t need to carry a drogue on 100m of Dyneema. Nor do you need warps for the panama canal. Our warps are long enough to be shore lines on any conceivable raft, and no longer. Thinking about it, our main anchor cable might be longer than 32 metres, plus of course theres chain on it too. But it’s not massive, and generally, we only need a few metres of it. If we can wade ashore from an anchorage, we are delighted.

 

[Frank Holden]

I have 2 x 220 metre lengths of 10mm Polyprop plus two half coils for use as shore lines in Patagonia. Only used the full length of one coil once, in a truly horrid anchorage - Bahia Borja - at the top end of Paso Tortuoso, Estrecho de Magallanes. I wont be stopping there again in a hurry.
Stowed in 'bolsas para verduras' secured to the taffrail when out and about, otherwise they live in the 'garden shed'. When in use I hang them under the end of the boom as shown.
Pic is 2 weeks before the austral winter solstice at the western end of Canal Beagle, getting underway at 0900. Oh Happy Days!

 

[Sea Change]

220m of 10mm sea steel. Not really sure what we might need it for but I had it in the shed and thought it might come in handy.

 

[onesea]

35 metres. Ready for Polperro

That will be 2 metres to short !

I was trying to use there to guess my rope lengths.

So that would be 37 meters actually managed to put bow and stern on the slip. Which was handy, single handed.

 

[zoidberg]

I have 2 x 220 metre lengths of 10mm Polyprop plus two half coils for use as shore lines in Patagonia.

View attachment 179525

You win, Frank!

But do please explain the two vertical rods - one white, one black - secured to the s'board quarter pushpittery.