Anchor Trip-Line Techniques

[roger.waite]

I love the trip lines buoyed by brightly coloured floats.

Open a beer, and wait for some fool to use it as a mooring buoy.

[HopCar]

I'm a little surprised nobody has mentioned attaching the chain to the trip line hole at crown of the anchor. You then run the chain along the shank of the anchor and lash it with small stuff or a tie wrap to it's normal attachment point. As long as there is plenty of scope out, no load is put on the lashing and the anchor functions normally. If the anchor gets stuck, you just bring in the rode until it's vertical. This puts the load on the lashing which breaks and allows you to pull the anchor out backward. I've seen this done fairly often in So. Florida and the Bahamas. I like Nigels idea but I might buy an anchor ring from a ring style anchor lifter to replace the ring of shackles. The anchor ring would ptobable slide over the shank of the anchor easier than the ring of shackles or a loop of chain. You wouldn't use the float, just the ring and a trip line with a snap hook on one end. Go here to see what I'm talking about: Anchor Retrival System
I'm sorry for putting a link to my own website here but it has the best photo of an anchor ring I could find. Just click the picture to enlarge it.

[daddle]

Originally Posted by HopCar

...nobody has mentioned attaching the chain to the trip line hole at crown of the anchor. You then run the chain along the shank of the anchor and lash it with small stuff or a tie wrap to it's normal attachment point. As long as there is plenty of scope out, no load is put on the lashing and the anchor functions normally. ...

That sounds dangerous enough, if I understand it right. Won't the lashing break if the boat swings in a wind or current shift? Then it's like having no anchor at all.

People do this in Florida?

[HopCar]

"That sounds dangerous enough, if I understand it right. Won't the lashing break if the boat swings in a wind or current shift? Then it's like having no anchor at all. People do this in Florida?"

I actually learned about that trick as a kid reading Chapman's. I've tried it several times and never broken the lashing, either by accident or on purpose. I usually don't bother, but yes it is not an uncommon method to use where you think the anchor might foul. Like you, I'm not sure I'd trust it enough to sleep on it. I like the idea of sending a loop down the rode with a trip line if you ever need to. Those anchor retrival systems that use a buoy work great if you don't have a windlass. The float and your boat do all the lifting to get the anchor to the surface. You just have to lift it onto the boat.

[Amgine]

Where I cruise, the west coast of Canada, most bottoms are rock, fouled with timbering slash and cable, or a very brief glacial gravel/mud delta in a fjord.

I've pretzeled a couple cheap danforth-types, and lost an original bruce, because I usually do not rig a trip line. And that's without any form of windlass. The reality for me is: rigging a trip line is better seamanship, but takes skill and time I'm usually unwilling to put into the job. That makes me a poorer, more dangerous sailor. Every time I've ruined an anchor I've promised myself I'll do better, and I do, for a while.

[Ian R]

Originally Posted by HopCar
...nobody has mentioned attaching the chain to the trip line hole at crown of the anchor. You then run the chain along the shank of the anchor and lash it with small stuff or a tie wrap to it's normal attachment point. As long as there is plenty of scope out, no load is put on the lashing and the anchor functions normally. ...

I do this but only for fishing.Don't leave the boat and don't sleep.

[Duncan aus]

Hopcar I'm glad someone beat me too this, I was reading through amazed that people haven't mentioned this method!
Instead of lashing you can attach a weak strong point, the same style used for liferafts, this won't break under the load of ur boat, but under extreme pressure will break( and by extreme I mean pulling the bow downwards) then the chain is free to act like a trip line.
I know alot of people who have fouled their anchors on bottom debris and wished they had a trip line...

[Hydra]

I remember an anchorage in a tidal river, deep (maybe 10m at LW) and narrow (Landévennec, for the Breton CF members). It would have been incorrect to anchor for the night in the middle of the channel. Then, I chose to anchor closer to the windward shore. But the land was fairly high and the wind kept changing direction. With the proper scope for the depth at HW, the boat could have been pushed aground at LW. I wasn't sure that the bottom was clean, for there was a forest on the shore and some obstructions downriver.

The only solution I found was to use 2 anchors, one from the bow (upriver) and one from the stern (downriver), with a trip line and a float (a fender) on each. Since this location is really remote, there was'nt much risk that somebody took a fender for a mooring buoy.

Alain

[nylajo]

This device is called an Anchorex.
When the anchor becomes fouled you lower a plastic collar which is part of the kit down the rode. The collar has a hook which releases the stainless collar on the jaw which then enables you to retreive the anchor by the crown with the light chain that goes from the s/s collar to the crown.
I have owned this device for ten years now.

[Vasco]

Originally Posted by goincruisin

not sure where you have been cruising, but there are most certainly many boats out there using trip lines. The only "cruising boats" not using them would be charter boats...

I guess you don't go to the Bahamas. The only boats using trip lines are newbies. Trip lines are a definite no no. They only get fouled either on your prop and rudder or on some poor dink that's heading home after dark.

As an aside, before my first trip south I had read in some sailing rag that you should buoy your anchor. When I set out I dutifully did this for a week with a nice little fender that bobbed on the surface. One morning in the Chesapeake I awoke to find my little fender gone. I cursed the low life bum that would swipe a nice little fender in the night, picked up my hook and started motoring out of the anchorage. I then heard a whomp, whomp, whomp as we went.

Stopped, went over the side and, sure enough, the little fender was wrapped around the prop!

[Bash]

last time I used a trip line, a guy in a Bayliner tied up to the ball, thinking it was a mooring ball.

[Vasco]

Originally Posted by Bash

last time I used a trip line, a guy in a Bayliner tied up to the ball, thinking it was a mooring ball.

Did you collect $30?

[Blue Stocking]

I often put down my 35 lb CQR on a soft sandy bottom, under which are numerous abandoned cables. over a few days, anchor and chain bury deep in sand, and would be difficult to unsnare from the cables.
I attach yellow 1/4" polypro to shank head, up, and thru eye on clorox bottle, back on itself with a skackle and a 6 0z fishing weight. This is enough weight to sink down, and keep the line vertical

[Kettlewell]

I'm in the no trip line camp. My bottom line is that I can't remember ever fouling my anchor on something I couldn't pull up to the surface or dive on, so the odds are very high that I will not need one in any given anchorage. I've thought about what I would do if it were fouled, and that is to take a huge shackle I have and put it around the rode, and with the anchor on very short scope try to slide it down to the anchor to pull out backwards. However, with all or mostly chain rode I think this would be difficult. On the other hand, putting a float out there seems to be asking for trouble. If for some reason I knew that the bottom was full of junk or was extremely rocky and I had to anchor there, I could see using a trip line if there weren't many other boats around.

[Hydra]

I think it is time to start 2 polls:
- What is the average depth (at High Water) in the anchorages where you usually drop anchor?
- Can you dive in this depth to free a fouled anchor?

For me, the answers are:
- 15m (50') in the English Channel
- No...

Alain