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CRANBERRY · 29-04-2015, 12:38

Hi Paul,
Have you ever heard of an "anchor buddy"?
They are a weight you can slide down the anchor chain which effectively gives the same effect as more chain or heavier chain, They work a treat

cabo_sailor · 29-04-2015, 13:56

Cranberry,
Are you talking about a "kettle"?

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**Pete7** · 29-04-2015, 14:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tayana42

I'm of the school of NextGen anchor, as big as you can handle and all chain. However, the OP in in the Chesapeake for the next few years. A good NextGen anchor a boat length of chain and a proper length of rope rode should do fine for now. He can buy more chain, a bow roller and windlass before he ventures off. S/V B'Shert

I agree. We have a similar sized yacht (10,000 lbs) and a Rocna 10kg. We also don't keep it on the bows, but in an anchor locker up the sharp end. I consider the 10kg as a working sized anchor which I can deploy and recover by hand, although I do have a manual winch. If the anchor and rode is easy to use then you will use it often.

When you say you want to cross the Atlantic, be assured a 10kg Rocna will work just as well this side of the pond.

A nice big Fortress as a spare would be useful when you find a second hand one at a good price.

Pete

secrabtree · 29-04-2015, 15:14

PickPaul - If you didn't have a minimum of one boatlength of chain between your rope rode and your fortress anchor the dragging was to be expected. Fortress anchors hold when the pull is nearly horizontal and that is the function of the chain. Very few anchors, none that I know of, will hold when the pull is not nearly horizontal, though different anchors are a little more tolerant. Anchor manufacturers are usually conservative when recommending the size of their anchor for a particular weight or length boat. Check if the Fortress is adequately large for your boat according to Fortress. I expect it probably is and the failure was in not having enough chain.
An aside. I was race commettee chairman and my mark setters were not able to anchor the marks so that they wouldn't drift' The race course was in a shallow lake with chop. They were using 10# Danforth knockoffs on 4' tall tetrehedral inflatable marks. What was happening was that the marks were bouncing in the chop and working the anchors looke from the mud bottom. I tried putting a 5# Danforth knockoff at the end of the 7' chain (light chain - like what's on a dog leash for a cocker spaniel) portion of the rode and another 5# anchor (it probably could have been just a 5# weight) at the other end of the chain. Than the rope rode almost vertical to the mark. Held beautifully. As the mark went up and down in the chop the pull on the anchor remained close to horizontal.

ranger58sb · 30-04-2015, 04:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by CRANBERRY

Hi Paul,
Have you ever heard of an "anchor buddy"?
They are a weight you can slide down the anchor chain which effectively gives the same effect as more chain or heavier chain, They work a treat

Quote:

Originally Posted by cabo_sailor

Cranberry,
Are you talking about a "kettle"?

Kellet?

I thought the "anchor buddy" things were for manually bringing a heavy anchor back aboard... but haven't ever really shopped on 'em.

-Chris

ranger58sb · 30-04-2015, 04:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by ranger42c

I don't see where you say what size the "fortress knock-off" was? (Really? Aluminum? Or is it a steel Danforth-style? Or...?)

Nor is it clear why it dragged? In our experience, a well--set Fortress of appropriate size doesn't just up and decide to drag just because the wind, tide, or current shifted. Key words of course are "well-set" and "appropriate size."

Quote:

Originally Posted by secrabtree

PickPaul - If you didn't have a minimum of one boatlength of chain between your rope rode and your fortress anchor the dragging was to be expected. Fortress anchors hold when the pull is nearly horizontal and that is the function of the chain. Very few anchors, none that I know of, will hold when the pull is not nearly horizontal, though different anchors are a little more tolerant. Anchor manufacturers are usually conservative when recommending the size of their anchor for a particular weight or length boat. Check if the Fortress is adequately large for your boat according to Fortress. I expect it probably is and the failure was in not having enough chain.

Good point, similar to what I touched on earlier. Understanding why the current anchor failed could be very useful for determining course of action going forward.

Not big enough? Not set correctly? Inappropriate rode?

Or all that was OK and the wind shift really was the only cause?

Although that sometimes suggests not big enough, not set correctly, and/or inappropriate rode

-Chris

secrabtree · 30-04-2015, 16:59

My boat is a 1971 Cal 39 that I bought in 1978 and still own. It came with a 23# Danforth and a 45# Danforth, and 250' of 3/8" chain. Until I left for Mexico I used the 23#. The only time I used the 45# was to kedge off a sandbar in the Sacramento-San Joaquin delta. The 23# held fine in heavy chop in the Berkeley mud flats in 30+ knots of wind and 8" water depth. It held fine in 4+ knots of current when I anchored in the river to sleep in the breeze because the house didn't have air conditioning. A group of us sailed to Half Moon Bay and one of my friends laughed at me because "the Danforth gets tangled". He dragged with his 45# CQR and brought it ub with the chain rapped around the shaft. As Nat Hereshoff said about the CQR "humanity has spent centuries developing a plow to go through the ground easier and now someone's proposing to use it as an anchor?" There are MANY plough type anchors that do hold well, but their shapes are all very poor for an agricultural plow. The CQR isn't poor for an agricultural plow.

secrabtree · 30-04-2015, 17:08

One more thing about the CQR and other anchors - the CQR needs to be heavy because a good portion of it's holding pwer is due to it's weight. Most other anchors hold almost completely by digging in.
And I repeat, the value of the chain is two fold. First it causes the pull on the anchor to be closer to horizontal than the depth:rode length would be if it was all rope rode. Second is that the chain hangs in a "deeper" catenary curve than an all rope rode would. As the chop moves the boat up and down the catenary becomes shallower and deeper. This performs as a snubber would - it reduces the "jerking" on both the anchor and on the boat.

Hawkeye · 01-05-2015, 04:52

In every generation there are lovers and haters of certain specific anchors. Some years ago, the majority of real cruising boats used the genuine forged CQR with great success. Then two companies, Australian, I think, came up with the Rocna and Manson. At first they competed against each other, but they soon realized they would do much better if they could dislodge the CQR from the top position. They did this with fabricated marketing techniques. Now, I'm going to tell you something - there is no such thing as the PERFECT anchor. They thought the Danforth was one, the Bruce, and the CQR. But EVERY anchor can fail if it is either, improperly deployed, used in an area where it's best aspects cannot be exploited, little or no chain, too little scope, and my favorite, just blatantly misused to provide a false failure during a bullcrap anchoring test. The greatest victim of this type of designed failure test exposure has been the CQR. I see the same old false marketing sound byte being repeated here. If I had the interest I would go find the old tests and expose all the foolishness. The Bruce anchor did not go out of business because it was a bad anchor i it went out of business because an enormous flood of cheap counterfeits drove them out of business. The plowing your field crap can ONLY happen if you shorten the scope on your plow so much the blade cannot dig in, or if you try to use it in some places in the Bahamas where 1 to 2 feet of loose sand sits over hardpan. Almost anything will drag there, but a big Fortress or Danforth will hold as long as the wind doesn't pipe up over ten or so. I never had a problem with my CQR's, though I know you can't rely upon them to magically set without supervision. The best anchor I have ever used is the Spade, and this is the only one that has ever dragged on me. I'd sailed alone for way too long in nasty weather and anchored while exhausted. Not enough scope. The tide came in and I dragged toward the beach. The anchor reset a hundred yards from shore and held throughout the night. When I awoke and saw what had happened, I realized how lucky I had been and wrote the whole truth in my online log. It's easy to say you were stupid and should not have become careless - it's much harder to fix a seriously damaged boat. Use your head. Read and study everything you can, but don't, under any circumstances, swallow what a marketing blurb is selling, and learn to recognize those bytes in the recommendations of others. There are more than a few in this thread.

anacapaisland42 · 01-05-2015, 05:39

When anchored I like to drop, on a short leash, an anchor off the stern.
I've found that when/if an anchor drags or there is a drastic change in wind/current that the stern anchor will grab enough to make the boat rock enough to wake me up and I can check to see what's going on.
Any comments/suggestions welcome.
Bill

**noelex 77** · 01-05-2015, 07:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hawkeye

I see the same old false marketing sound byte being repeated here.

I can understand some scepticism from people that cruise in areas with medium soft substrates where the CQR works reasonably well, but there is an overwhelming body of evidence to show the superiority of new generation anchors, not just from anchor tests, but user reports and even underwater photos

.

Of course many of us managed with old generation anchor for years, but with more limitations than I would accept these days.

I still have a CQR buried in a locker somewhere. I will swap it for your Spade, but don't look below

.

pickpaul · 02-05-2015, 14:51

Thanks everyone! Great info. Rocna10 and 30 ft of 1/ 4 " it is. More chain and windlass later when travel and budget make it needed / possible.

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