Sea Anchors and Drogues

[conachair]

Originally Posted by Sevi

Hey All-

Does anyone have any experience or strong opinions regarding the necessity and use for sea anchors and/or drogue chutes? I'm planning on leaving in approximately 2 months for a five year circumnavigation.

Thanks in advance for your responses and help.

Which route for your circumnavigation? If it's the popular trade wind route then probably not many boats from that route actually have a great deal of experience really heavy weather

There are some excellent resources around to try and get a handle on what to expect and suggestions of how to cope...
http://estarzinger.com/estarzinger/articles.aspx

http://estarzinger.com/estarzinger/pdf/HeavyWeather.pdf

But complex, a decent blow mid-ocean might not be a big deal but if it's pointing the opposite direction from the gulf stream and you're in it then things could be really quite scary.

IMHO in addition to spending time on what to do when it gets nasty, a similar amount of research should go into researching how to avoid the nastiness.

Good luck with the voyage, 2 months will go in an instant

[reed1v]

Originally Posted by barnakiel

Now we are talking!

Read the passage again.

Is he hove-to?

"...to sail slowly into the gale, close-hauled..."

We are getting somewhere. I agree sailing slowly into the gale, close-hauled, IS in fact a valid storm management technique for a small boat.

I call this fore-reaching. Not heaving to.

Heaving to I get the main on one side, jib on the wrong side and tiller tied to the lee. Now my boat is not sailing, it is slowly DRIFTING while hesitating between the push from the main and the drag from the jib.

Doh.

Happy to know we are able to find what impeded our communication.

At times this looks like this:
https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/i...XQeQ2nF777o5Qd

Big hug,
b.

Its an effective storm tactic if you got a storm sail on the main and are willing to be at the helm. However, once you get to hurricane winds, its almost an impossible strategy.

[Snowpetrel]

Originally Posted by Olddave

Hi Snow Petrel
Your experience is very interesting. I have wondered if the technique will work with a furler. Maybe not. I would have thought that the power of the mainsail behind the mast would be enough to keep the bow into the wind.
What did you do with the rudder and what self steering did you have? Jon Sanders used his windvane throughout the worst storms. Sometimes he says he was close hauled and other times he calls it Hove-to, but describes the same method throughout. It doesn't fit the traditional concept of Heaving-to with jib backed and helm over.
As you know, the seas that he encountered and survived were phenomenal.
(Snip)

Like you, I would have thought just the reefed main would have held the bow up, I was very suprized when I dropped the storm jib and found she lay more or less beam on to the bigger seas, she would poke her nose up at times but it would fall off as she rose up a sea. Nothing I did with the sheet or tiller seemed to help much, and I tried for a long time. She was the short inline rig , short boom version. Fleming 301? Vane. Big genoa on a furler. Prehaps she needed a touch more rake, the seldon furler had a fixed length stay. Prehaps a longer footed trysail would have worked, prehaps a drogue off the bow?

A smaller storm jib would have been great. With a tiny storm jib I could have kept sailing to windward. As I said if what I should have tried was to drop the main and just use the Storm Jib on it's babystay, ahh well..

[StuM]

Originally Posted by barnakiel

We are getting somewhere. I agree sailing slowly into the gale, close-hauled, IS in fact a valid storm management technique for a small boat.

I call this fore-reaching. Not heaving to.

Heaving to I get the main on one side, jib on the wrong side and tiller tied to the lee. Now my boat is not sailing, it is slowly DRIFTING while hesitating between the push from the main and the drag from the jib.

That's the way I used the terms too.

No point in "pouring oil on troubled waters" if you are fore-reaching, you need to be hove-to and drifting for the slick to stay upwind of you.

[Don C L]

Originally Posted by Snowpetrel

Prehaps a longer footed trysail would have worked, prehaps a drogue off the bow?

Hmm, I have a trysail, but never used it... still I have always been under the impression that the point of a trysail, the trysail's shape, long foot and short luff, was to do what a triple reefed main won't; keep the nose up (?)

[Snowpetrel]

^^ Yes Don, thays the theory, and there is merit to it I think. Though I will still stick with my trysail reef as being much quicker and easier to deal with.

Another thread on heaving to here

Originally Posted by Snowpetrel

There is a great book called south seas vagabond. Jonny Wray used to swear by heaving too, with whale oil. Worked well for him for years until he got caught in a cyclone and rolled while hove too. After rolling he ran off towing his his spars, mainsail and anythibg else while he baled out the water and repaired the old wooden boat. After that he said running off towing everything was the ultimate storm technique. Eventually either while hove to the sails will shred or you will end up nearer beam on during the bigger seas, unless you combine it with a drag device like the pardeys to help hold the bow up.

There is another weird way to heave too, just back the headsail and drop the main, keep the helm up. Its like heaving too by the stern. It kind of works, certainly damps the roll and makes a nice slick. But the bow ends up downwind. I can see this being useful with a series drogue off the stern quarter, but I havent tried it this way, but if it didnt work it would be easy enough to roll away the headsail and centre the rudder.

Video of us sitting this way in a mild southern ocean frontal passage here.

https://youtu.be/CJMIBbt2svo

Sent from my SM-G930F using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

Sent from my SM-G930F using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[reed1v]

Each boat really is different when it comes to storm tactics and how it reacts to being hove to. Sometimes its just the weight distribution; sometimes the way the seas behave. You need to adjust your strategy to the moment and have some guiding principles: like do not be on the fore deck.

Even if you are well tethered to the boat, a ten foot sea can force your body through the tether like bits of chopped meat. Human bodies are basically jello with straws holding it together. Fifteen tons of water will easily force the tethered straps to rip through your body at every contact point.

[Dirk Williams]

I know nothing about these devices, other then I intend to have one of each. Im also a goodlander fan, and can see the value of setting one when needed. I don't know enough yet to know what to purchase.

Still studying, and asking lots of questions regarding the chutes. Some things to me, are just no brainers. I know their not cheep, but again for me a must have.

Dirk

[Lepke]

I tuna fished a 55', 40 ton boat and used a drogue or sea anchor many times. Usually at the end of the day, we just shut down and drifted. But in heaver seas a drogue gave a better ride. I found in really big seas, especially when survival was an issue, smaller was better. A big sea anchor on a long rode can get below the wave action and "anchor" your boat. Then you really get battered. With a smaller anchor you travel with the waves and they don't hit the bow as hard. Also trailing heavy line helps keep the bow into the waves. Open ocean, no lee shore.

[barnakiel]

Originally Posted by reed1v

Its an effective storm tactic if you got a storm sail on the main and are willing to be at the helm. However, once you get to hurricane winds, its almost an impossible strategy.

I believe you are 100% right.

Our boat does not require helming close hauled. Boats that do may be helmed remotely from the relative safety of the cabin, with a RC on the AP.

This actually underscores the importance of drogues and sea anchors for those moments when surviving under sails is no longer an option.

b.

[barnakiel]

From the many accounts of sea anchors (parachutes, bow deployment) I have read, I have gathered the following:

- buy quality, (they get very loaded)
- buy big, (not too big, but often bigger than we imagine)
- keep plenty of anti-chafe at hand,
- deploy carefully, (wet it, use a pilot cone, etc)
- read related Pardeys and Dashews.

As far as drogues are concerned (smaller devices, stern deployment, to slow down, and to limit broaches): they work, and some sailors employed car tires while others towed deltas or seabrakes, galeriders, etc. We towed looped warp. Later we discovered that the smae warp streamed worked ... better.

So with the drogues: have something tested and easy to deploy, or improvise.

IN ANY CASE : make sure you have enough warp / chain / etc to deploy - those ocean waves can be hundred+ meters (not feet!) long too ...

We do not have a parachute but I believe we should have one. We now carry a seabrake by Burke.

Cheers,
b.

[Panope]

For a bow deployed parachute type drag device, it seems that the anchor rode would be perfect as it is strong, heavy and often chafe proof (chain). Now that I think of it, maybe leave the anchor attached as well. The extra weight can't hurt.

Thoughts?

Steve

[barnakiel]

Originally Posted by Panope

For a bow deployed parachute type drag device, it seems that the anchor rode would be perfect as it is strong, heavy and often chafe proof (chain). Now that I think of it, maybe leave the anchor attached as well. The extra weight can't hurt.

Thoughts?

Steve

I munched this idea countless times too. Never tried.

My mindset, at now:

- deploy an anchor and some chain (say 100'),
- tie a bunch of big fenders onto the chain at this point,
- deploy this device with some 200' of anchor rope.

I will make a drawing.

What do you think?

b.

[a64pilot]

You can't come close to equalling the drag of say an 18' chute with anything. I think you want some stretch. Call a manufacturer, you may be surprised at the rode recommendation, I was.


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[Don C L]

Originally Posted by Lepke

I tuna fished a 55', 40 ton boat and used a drogue or sea anchor many times. Usually at the end of the day, we just shut down and drifted. But in heaver seas a drogue gave a better ride. I found in really big seas, especially when survival was an issue, smaller was better. A big sea anchor on a long rode can get below the wave action and "anchor" your boat. Then you really get battered. With a smaller anchor you travel with the waves and they don't hit the bow as hard. Also trailing heavy line helps keep the bow into the waves. Open ocean, no lee shore.

So I have yet to try this, but I had thought the major problem with not being held firm by a para-anchor was the potential for damage to the rudder if the boat is able to slide back down on a wave. In your experience did you find any problem with falling back on the rudder?