Temporary "permanent" mooring on the cheap

[onestepcsy37]

Originally Posted by youngson

How many do you think is enough for an oday 27?

We are in east central florida on the icw. Strong tidal currents and occasional strong winds. My friends 36 foot morgan sat on 8 brake drums for 5 years. A 50 foot catamaran also sat here about two years on 8 brake drums.

I would think that 3 drums would work for you. But they are cheap so maybe get 4. Just be sure to get the large dump truck sized drums; car drums are way undersized.

By the way you DON'T need a 3000 pound concrete block as a minimum to hold your boat. The guy who posted that is either a joker or is the joke.

[jreiter190]

Originally Posted by Rick Williams

we've had a lot of success with screw anchors. Most of our bottoms are either sand or mud/sand and the screw anchors can be installed by a person with scuba gear. They screw in with some effort and a big bar but after a couple days appear to be impossible to remove with a straight pull and we usually put three down and link them together into one swivel connector. If it's a hurricane mooring you can put an anchor out from each screw anchor. The whole thing doesn't depend on weight and can actually be done without a barge if the bottom is soft enough to accept screw anchors and the local regs allow it. The power company use them to hold their pols up or you can get them from Home Depot or there's a guy I found at the boat show that makes them for our demographics and before anyone tells me that's crazy, it will never work, it does and has worked well here in Florida for many years and many hurricanes.

I love that idea! Where in Florida can you use this technique? I'm in Melbourne.

[onestepcsy37]

Originally Posted by jreiter190

I love that idea! Where in Florida can you use this technique? I'm in Melbourne.

Be careful. Over on the west coast (of florida) a municipal mooring field has had serious problems with screw anchors pulling out. Think it was st. Pete but not certain. Story was in southwinds magazine.

[jreiter190]

I just was wondering where in the state of Florida you could get away with installing your own private mooring. Are there designated areas you can do this? I can think of lots of places I'd like a mooring bit I don't think I could get away with it.

[Cadence]

Originally Posted by jreiter190

I just was wondering where in the state of Florida you could get away with installing your own private mooring. Are there designated areas you can do this? I can think of lots of places I'd like a mooring bit I don't think I could get away with it.

You're probably SOL. It is probably due some of these anchoring ideas but probably more due to having to get rid of abandoned or sunken boats by the municipality. Leading a boating life sounds good to many and then the realization of cost hits. If you find one a boat can probably bought for a nickel on the dollar. Bring a pump.

[Jeff Bird]

Old HAM radios are said to make very good "boat anchors"

[onestepcsy37]

Originally Posted by jreiter190

I just was wondering where in the state of Florida you could get away with installing your own private mooring. Are there designated areas you can do this? I can think of lots of places I'd like a mooring bit I don't think I could get away with it.

Come on down to Daytona Beach. Around ICW Marker 44, opposite the water treatment plant, you will find a dozen boats; half of them are on owner built moorings. My old mooring is now being used by a friend. None of us asked anyone for permission. Some moorings are over 5 years old. There are impromptu mooring fields all over Florida.

Because it is not a designated anchorage you must display an anchor light. The local fuzz accepts bright garden solar lights at deck level.

[Stumble]

Originally Posted by onestepcsy37

We are in east central florida on the icw. Strong tidal currents and occasional strong winds. My friends 36 foot morgan sat on 8 brake drums for 5 years. A 50 foot catamaran also sat here about two years on 8 brake drums.

I would think that 3 drums would work for you. But they are cheap so maybe get 4. Just be sure to get the large dump truck sized drums; car drums are way undersized.

By the way you DON'T need a 3000 pound concrete block as a minimum to hold your boat. The guy who posted that is either a joker or is the joke.

Yup I must be joking, even though the data is direct from Boat US, Jamestown Distributors, West Marine, anchoring studies and based on governmentally published data.

Mooring Basics - How to Install a Permanent Mooring

A 30' sailboat in a 60kn squall will generate roughly 3,000lbs of pulling force. To counteract that you need a substantial amount of deadweight mass in the ground. But as always your boat, your insurance premiums.

[RolfP]

I have put three Danforth style anchors in a triangle. I could pull it up each fall until two seasons ago when I think it got twisted down deep and I could not get it up. It holds well in all directions.

[Old Swampy]

When I picked up my 36' Cape Dory in Virginia, it was anchored in a cove by itself on a 20 lb.+ high-tensile Danforth in deep organic muck. The boat had been there long enough that the anchor was well buried. We bent it some getting it out. If you're allowed to anchor, and have deep muck, an anchor could work. You'd want to move the boat in anticipation of a hurricane.

[tdoster]

Originally Posted by Shrew

Anchoring is transient and mooring is not. You're not proposing anchoring, you're proposing installing a mooring. Most places have requirements for installing moorings. Many places require a permit. I don't think anyone is using engine blocks or cement filled radiators anymore. I know of many places where engine blocks are no longer allowed as moorings.

And we wonder why there are increased anchoring restrictions and mooring fields popping up everywhere.

I agree with this. So, after 8 months, the OP is going to cut the line and leave his garbage on the bottom of the river for the rest of us to snag our anchors on?

I hope I am wrong, but I have seen many dreams start out this way then become derelicts, and the reasons given for changing the laws that make it harder to cruise for respectful and responsible folks without money to burn.

[Rick Williams]

There is the problem with boats left to sink at a mooring in Florida, the land of broken sailing dreams, but so far there are no regulations that prohibit putting your own mooring down in the ICW which is substantially wide where we are. My anecdotal evidence and personal experience shows that they work very well. I had a friend whose trimaran "flew" in a hurricane while attached to a triple screw anchor mooring and wound up upside down with the mooring still solid and functional. Probably has a lot to do with the make up of the bottom but a sandy bottom accepts a crew anchor surprisingly easy and is loath to let them go. Obviously they have to be sized correctly and many options can be found by Googling "helix screw anchor"
There are ongoing lawsuits by the rich municipalities to rid themselves of people mooring off their mansions but so far the Federal government has retained control of the ICW as it's a "federally maintained navigable waterway" and to date have not banned mooring fields.

[onestepcsy37]

Originally Posted by Stumble

A 30' sailboat in a 60kn squall will generate roughly 3,000lbs of pulling force. To counteract that you need a substantial amount of deadweight mass in the ground.

I think you misunderstood the word "substantial". Not the same meaning as "equivalent".

I apologize for being flippant in my previous post.

[Cadence]

re: setting 3ooo#. Why you sail it out on your dinghy and then use your mainsail halyard to lift it and drop it in the sea. How else would you do it?


I can't take credit for this bit of humor. I got it via e-mail.

[Cadence]

Originally Posted by youngson

Hello there, I'm about to purchase an oday 27 and I will need to keep it anchored for the next 8 months or so, it will be in a river with a slow- medium current and a nasty mucky mud bottom, I was wondering if you had any techniques for cheap mooring that I can pair with the anchor? And what weight of cement you'd recommend and in what configuration etc.. Etc..
Thank you for any feed back

I had an ODay 27 back in days of yore. I nice little boat. Surely you gest about cement for an anchor. I am assuming she will be unattended on the mooring at times. If you like her buy a decent anchor not some jury rig. A soupy bottom makes it worse. And dead weight isn't it.

Several of us have been having fun with this.

I went back and read this. Find a knowlegable local for advise. If you can't moor her right consider putting her on the hill.

Best of luck.