Anchoring Technique

[Captron]

Sailing at anchor

In my experience, all boats sail at anchor. Some seem to sail a little more than others. The difference in how much they sail around seems small however. Every year we spend a lot of time anchored in Elizabeth Harbor, George Town, Exuma where there can be 400 boats anchored in close quarters. Sailing at anchor is not a problem even though everyone is sailing around.

Boats with riding sails also sail about some. From my observations, riding sails, especially on sloops, don't help that much. The riding sail fills on one side the aft end swings, then the sail fills on the other side and the boat sails back.

Riding sails also interfere with aft mounted wind generators. Our friends on a Morgan Classic (Out Island 41 Sloop built by Catalina) use a riding sail and have a wind generator. The wind generator gets blanketed by the riding sail and stops spinning at each swing of the boat.

The boats that sail around the least seem to be the ones with all or nearly all chain rodes. We don't sail around any more than other boats and we usually have down 100 feet of chain and 10-20 feet of nylon (more if scope requirements demand). Most boats with all chain use a nylon snubber. Also bigger boats seem to swing about less.

The one time when we do see big differences in how various boats swing is when there's little or no wind and the tide is changing. Then, boats will lie every which way at times. This probably has to do with differences in underwater configurations especially when some boats are power boats with no keels and small rudders. It is likely that there are differences in the current flow too.

Once upon a time we owned a cruising catamaran that would sail about a lot in the wind. You could blame the light weight and the small underwater configuration but I think it had more to do with the ground tackle. On the cat, to save weight, we used a short chain and mostly nylon rode.

 

[ref_123]

Current?

Hi Jay,

depending where on the bay you tried to anchor (btw, where was it?), a current may have been throwing your bow off. I cannot claim an expertise on SF bay anchoring (not yet, anyway), but at CA Channel Islands I saw it quite a bit...

Regards,
Stan

 

[celtium]

Actually I wasn't trying to anchor Stan, I was actually showing my girlfriend how to drive the boat etc. When I would come to a stop, showing / telling her how we would deploy the anchor I noticed this tendency.

It's new to me because of my experience with my E35 MKII which is a heavier displacement vessel.

At first we were on the far east side of Angel Island closer to the East Bay fooling around, then we got over to Paradise Cay in a real anchorage and found the same thing.

Paradise Cay is where I found that the vessel actually turned beam to the wind when I would try to go in reverse. The wind was about 25 knots and building. Maybe it was just the wind? But, as you know, that is not unusual in SF

LTR

Jay
E38-200, Celtica
SF Bay

 

[Seth]

Bridles are good for this, and...

Unless in unprotected areas, I am still a fan of anchoring off the stern. With a bridle off the stern cleats, the boat will sit facing DDW and not "sail" around the anchor at all. Another benefit is MUCH improved ventilation in the cabin.

You can do a conventional drop off the bow and then switch to the stern rig, or you lower the anchor off the stern from the get-go. Just stop where you want the anchor facing DDW, and lower away (drifting or going dead slow ahead).

This is not so nice in very rough anchorages, but most of the time it works great, and in crowded harbors you will have more confidence that you won't be visiting your neighbors as you "tack" back and forth on the anchor rode-it just doesn't happen when stern-to.

Cheers,

 

[sleather]

Stern to

I'm w/ Seth on this one(w/ a slight modification)

Most of my "big water" anchoring has been in the Apostle Islands, Lake Superior. The area is notorious for overnight wind shifts so after picking a bay w/ an offshore wind we would sail into about 10' of water(2' draft), drop sail and deploy a 9# Danforth w/ chain and 200' of floating poly anchor line, from the stern. When the boat leisurely reached the end of the line we would deploy a 13# Danforth from the bow and pull the boat back upwind(shoreward) w/ the stern anchor. With the two anchor lines "snug" there was NO "sailing" at anchor and IF the wind shifted we were riding on the main anchor. IF it got really bad you can dump the stern anchor(w/ the floating line) and retrieve it later.

It also provides a certain saftey factor in that you aren't sailing around the main anchor in a wind shift w/ the possibility of the anchor not resetting. It was relatively comfortable even in a 90* shift until the waves started slapping the side of the hull, in the middle of the night.

This method sure got some interesting comments from arriving neighbors.

 

[celtium]

Riding Sails

I just received my riding sail from Sailrite last night. Very nice work, they built it for me for about $160, seemed fair.

Interesting 'instructions' said:

"A properly rigged traditional anchor riding sail can eliminate swinging without the disadvantages of the 'wedge' described above. We find the size of the sail is actually not critical, but the way it is rigged matters a good deal. It should be hoisted on the backstay. Then sheet the sail forward to the side of the boat so that it is actually sailing the boat to one side of the anchor rode. The boat will only swing so far out as to reach equilibrium with the windage on the topsides. There it will stop and hold its position except for minor moves in response to changes in wind velocity (and tide in some cases). Notice that sheeting to the side clears the sail from the cockpit. And, if the backstay is split, it is perfectly OK to hoist it on the 'windward' leg of the backstay."

There were 3 other paragraphs but my carpel tunnel is already killing me!

Can't wait to try it considering that it appears the MKIII series likes to swing at anchor.

LTR

Jay
Celtica, E38-200
SF Bay

 

[Rocinante33]

Let us know how it works.

 

[u079721]

You will be amazed how well it works.....

I just received my riding sail from Sailrite last night. Very nice work, they built it for me for about $160, seemed fair.

Interesting 'instructions' said:

"A properly rigged traditional anchor riding sail can eliminate swinging without the disadvantages of the 'wedge' described above. We find the size of the sail is actually not critical, but the way it is rigged matters a good deal. It should be hoisted on the backstay. Then sheet the sail forward to the side of the boat so that it is actually sailing the boat to one side of the anchor rode. The boat will only swing so far out as to reach equilibrium with the windage on the topsides. There it will stop and hold its position except for minor moves in response to changes in wind velocity (and tide in some cases). Notice that sheeting to the side clears the sail from the cockpit. And, if the backstay is split, it is perfectly OK to hoist it on the 'windward' leg of the backstay."

There were 3 other paragraphs but my carpel tunnel is already killing me!

Can't wait to try it considering that it appears the MKIII series likes to swing at anchor.

LTR

Jay
Celtica, E38-200
SF Bay

You should be amazed how well it works. Check out my article at Good Old Boat on using riding sails: http://www.boatus.com/goodoldboat/horsing.asp

 

[Rocinante33]

Steve,

Nice article! Very informative & I enjoyed it.

 

[celtium]

Good stuff!!

Planning on an 'anchor out' the weekend of 6/13, will let you know how the Sailrite Riding Sail works. I haven't found another one for the price, there labor rate was fair, so we'll see.

The comment about sheeting it to the leeward rail was interesting, will let you all know.

Thanks for all the input! It was truly a worthy midweek musing.

Jay
Celtica, E38-200
SF Bay