Anchor Tensioner

B

bcassal

New member
On our recent trip to Florida, we thought we would take Carpy out onto the Atlantic, mostly just to say we had. We had come across the Okeechobee waterway to Port St. Lucie and we headed out the Port St. Lucie Inlet. There were breakers, 4-5 ft. The ride was rough, Carpy was doing fine and we felt secure. We came off one of these breakers and it shook the anchor off the roller. Yikes! There we are in 5 ft swells and we had just dropped anchor! After some tense moments, this ended well. Joyce, bravely went to the bow and retrieved the anchor while I maintained our position. We secured the anchor and went on through the inlet, there was turning back at that point, made our Atlantic appearance and quickly went back to calmer waters.
To prevent this from happening again, I have installed a chain tensioner to hold things in place. It is permenently mounted is now part of anchoring procedure. Does anyone use these things, I don't recall seeing any in the albums.
There is a photo in my album-Mods.

Bruce Cassal
"Carpy"
 
Yes. Both my 22 and my Tomcat came with one installed from the factory.

For the benefit of others, here's the image of Bruce's anchor chain tensioning device.
DSC01047.jpg
 
We had a similar experience caused by a cruise ship wake outside of Victoria, B.C. :shock: :shock: The anchor bounced out of the anchor pulpit, self deployed and was kept from running out all 300' of rode by one slim bungee cord. lessons learned: Install a bail on the anchor pulpit, install a device to keep the anchor secure, in our case a Lewmar windlass.
 
Windlass clutches do sometimes come loose with pounding seas so I wouldn't count on the windlass to keep the anchor up. It's better to use a tensioner or other device to keep the anchor up in heavy seas (and even some tensioners can pop free).
 
Yes, my 22 has one--probably factory installed. I normally use a line or piece of shock cord to secure the anchor--always! I will use a line to the cleat, as well as the tensioner. I also never trust a windlass to hold an anchor.
 
I use a heavy duty rubber tensioner on the tomcat. It's a version of those that truckers use to secure their loads. It works well and doesn't involve drilling any holes.
 
We have an anchor tensioner on the "KELLY LYNN" it a little piece of mind when trailering and when going through some dicey waters. There is pics in my album under modifications.
 
I use a short tarp strap and a length of 3/8" line attached to the cleat on the foredeck to secure the anchor.
No way in hadies is it getting away or banging around.
 
I don't have a picture, but I used a 2' or so section of 1/2" 3 strand line and made a backsplice at each end. At one end, the loop is 7" so it can be passed over the 10" bow cleat. At the other end, I put a quick release shackle that hooks into the chain. This can get the anchor in fairly tight, and make it extremely secure. But to prevent it from rattling around in the bow roller, I use a rubber bungee in parallel with the line. The bungee does most of the work, but if it deteriorated or broke for any other reason, there's the looped line as backup.
 
I have always used a short bit of 5/16 yacht braid to tie the anchor back to the cleat for road or sea. It's long enough to do a couple wraps around the stock of the anchor to keep it all quiet and secure. Cost? A couple bucks and no holes in the deck. George
 
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