Grapnel Anchor

[off-the-grid]

Who travels with one? Have you ever actually had to use it?
Since it's probably used rarely, and only for bottoms where your other anchors would be useless...do you have a dedicated chain and rode on it, or do you just share the rode with one of your other back up anchors to save weight, space, and cost?

I have one now, that I'm going to use up in NJ for wreck diving, but just trying to figure out what to do with it when I head South.

[Bash]

please don't use it in coral, or on any wreck of historical/archeological significance.

you'll find that the further you get from New Jersey, the less acceptance you'll find for a grapnel hook.

[off-the-grid]

If anything, I was thinking people use them only in an emergency.

[klem]

I carry a small one but not for anchoring. It is in case I foul a lobster trap line so that I can pull it up to the surface and then pull it forward to free it from the prop. It also doubles as a dinghy anchor.

I would never try to anchor my boat with it though. Having seen them while diving, they do a fair amount of damage and they are also pretty precarious.

[Pete7]

Having used one extensively on a rib whilst diving, there have been a couple of occasions when we couldn't lift it because one fluke had berried itself in the mud of Belfast Lough. No choice but to put the kit back on and go down to lift it. Thats with a 2:1 scope.

For a small boat they work well, though later we changed to a shot weight and kept the boat moving rather than anchoring to the wreck, because if it does catch on a wreck you might not get it back again.

Local charter boats use steel rods welded together as a grapel which will bend and give enabling the anchor to be brought up, re shaped and used again.

Pete

[off-the-grid]

Around here it always has to be freed by a diver. The grapnel is tied in and last one out of the water unties it, and rides it up until it's clear of the wreck.

And before this turns into another safety thread, like last time I brought up grapnels. This is SOP around here and has been since long before I even started diving. This is the way they do it on everything from < 100fsw inshore dives up to the Andria Doria. And no, there is no way a diver is getting pulled to the surface on that line. Considering the weight of the anchor and a properly weighted diver, that current would have to be ripping so fast that the divers would have never made it back to the anchor line in the first place.

Sorry for the rant, but this really turned into a lecture last time.