"Configurable" Ground Tackle...?

[FabioC]

The ground tackle I currently carry on my boat is a Bruce with 50' of chain and 150' of rope. I find this "adequate" since we primarily sail the boat out of a marina, and it makes sense to keep her "light", given that we rarely anchor.
We anchor overnight perhaps 3 or 4 times per season, plus we may go for a cruise for, say, 10 days in summer.
The few times we anchor overnight, however, I feel uneasy because I would much prefer a new-generation anchor rather than the Bruce, and would be much more comfortable with more chain.

Thus, in preparation of our next cruise, I was thinking... would it makes sense, just prior to a trip in which we know that we would anchor, to "swap" the Bruce with, say, a Rocna (I would not want to have the Rocna permanently, because it has a much higher probability than the Bruce of catching the gennaker on the rollbar...) and "prolong the chain by, say, an extra hundred feet, with an extra shackle. Then, at the end of the trip, switch back to the "lighter" configuration and take the Rocna and extra chain home...

This would make sense to me, at least in principle - then, why I am not seeing anybody doing such a thing?... I see other boats at my dock who have somewhat undersized ground tackle because, like me, primarily sail out of the dock and do not deploy the anchor much... However, like me, once in a while they do, but do not seem to care of swapping the anchor...

What am I not getting? Why don't people do this? Is swapping anchors so awkward to be impractical? is adding some extra chain temporarily such a no-no? (I understand it is not ideal, but does it really matter for just a few days?). What am I not seeing? Thank you!

[leecea]

I think you could swap anchors if you really wanted. Just be careful not to drop it

Adding chain would be a challenge as I'm assuming you use a windlass. You can't run a shackle through the windlass so you have to use a special link that connects the chains - I tried this one: https://www.westmarine.com/buy/seafi...05_154_002_004

They are hard to use - you need to pound on them with a big hammer against a very solid surface. Then you have to cut them if you want to remove them.

Perhaps you'd feel OK with a new anchor and the existing 50' of chain?

The other option is to buy the new anchor and 100' of chain, and add some nylon rode as well. Then just swap the entire set of ground tackle. You'd be anchoring with the new anchor and twice as much chain. it would be a lot of work to make the swap but you might find that you can't tell much difference in performance and you could just keep the 100' of chain in the bow and have the other rode as a spare.