Rocna Versus the World

[model 10]

Originally Posted by cwyckham

Would you care to elaborate? The Canadian versions of the Rocna are much sought after as they were made of better steel. What makes yours junk?

I have no complaints about the quality of the steel, not sure about the Galvanizing job yet.
I think they got the design wrong. The angle of incidence of the plow is not enough. You need too much chain on the bottom to not have the shank lift and decrease the angle of attack when you pull back on it. Or perhaps the shank is to long I don't know. I've watched it on a hard bottom with just 50' ft of chain in 15' while backing down. It will dig in enough to straighten out the chain, then the chain lifts the shank and it pulls back out. The roll bar might help if it landed up side down and does make a great handle Given how wide the thing is it probably needs the roll bar. I have seen it stop digging in, many times right at the roll bar. I can only think it sometimes stops the anchor from going any deeper. With such a large surface area, once it loads up with bottom gunk it does not seem to shed it's load and re set very well. I would be very worried with a really big wind shift over a bottom that might clog it up and it had to reset. Not sure it would.
I bought it early on in the new style anchor craze. Since then others have, I think, revised the design with new anchors. At the latest boat show I saw anchors that I think would dig in better and shed mud better.
The reason I am thinking of it as a piece of junk right now is, it/we drug really bad not to long ago and I 'm still pissed. I hope to recover because I will have it forever as I don't get a new boat or anchor.

[cwyckham]

Originally Posted by Guy

I have no complaints about the quality of the steel, not sure about the Galvanizing job yet.
I think they got the design wrong. The angle of incidence of the plow is not enough. You need too much chain on the bottom to not have the shank lift and decrease the angle of attack when you pull back on it. Or perhaps the shank is to long I don't know. I've watched it on a hard bottom with just 50' ft of chain in 15' while backing down. It will dig in enough to straighten out the chain, then the chain lifts the shank and it pulls back out. The roll bar might help if it landed up side down and does make a great handle Given how wide the thing is it probably needs the roll bar. I have seen it stop digging in, many times right at the roll bar. I can only think it sometimes stops the anchor from going any deeper. With such a large surface area, once it loads up with bottom gunk it does not seem to shed it's load and re set very well. I would be very worried with a really big wind shift over a bottom that might clog it up and it had to reset. Not sure it would.
I bought it early on in the new style anchor craze. Since then others have, I think, revised the design with new anchors. At the latest boat show I saw anchors that I think would dig in better and shed mud better.
The reason I am thinking of it as a piece of junk right now is, it/we drug really bad not to long ago and I 'm still pissed. I hope to recover because I will have it forever as I don't get a new boat or anchor.

Thanks for the detail. I do agree that the roll bar seems to be an impediment to really deep setting and contributes to gumming them up. Interesting to hear your first hand experience.

[flash]

I also would have had to modify my bow platform to handle a Rocna or Manson Supreme. Not wanting to do that, I spent a few bucks more (but saved the cost and headache of modifications) a bought a steel Spade. Excellent new gen anchor from my perspective which is confirmed by the independent tests, for what they're worth.