hawse-pipe - Gurus, need your advice

[vacendak]

how acceptable is installing the hawsepipe angularly, e.g. 45° to deck
or (better) with a 90° elbow ?
are there any common restrictions / requirements in the case ?

[Pblais]

If you are attempting to run to a chain locker farther away than directly under a windlass then getting this part wrong is going to mean lots of hassles.

With chain you need a straight drop so the weight of the free falling chain will hold the chain against the gypsy without slipping. This is very important. Anything less than 90 degrees is going to reduce the downward force. The chain can slip coming up and down. The other problem is when chain is going out it may catch on the bottom of the lip of what ever is making it not go straight up and down. A rotated link might jam the whole process.

[GordMay]

Chain, trying to pass through a 90 deg. elbow, will jam immediately.
Chain, trying to pass along a 45 deg. incline will jam quickly.
As Paul noted, chain needs to fall nearly vertically, which also improves the Gypsy's grip.

[vacendak]

what still remains unclear to me is that on the the following drawing:



I see a 90° turn of the chain - just below the gypsy

my question arises from rather complicated installation of chainlockers
on our new boat - either the chain must change it's direction or
I will never be able to reach the small forepeak without major surgery

[Pblais]

This is a quote from a vertical windlass manual made by Vetus. They all are similar. The chain "cones" up in a pile and the distance from the top of the pile to the bottom of the deck is the distance of free fall you need. Horizontal windlasses need the same thing.

The anchor should preferably be positioned above the deepest point of the chain locker. The chain has the tendency to heap itself up in a pyramid shape. Make the chain locker as deep as possible to prevent this problem. Make sure there is a free space of at least 30 cm between the underside of the deck and the top of the piled up chain. Polished stainless steel chain has fewer problems with becoming piled up in the chain locker because it is smooth. The chain should run out horizontally (max. 5˚) to the hawse pipe or the bow roller. Please note that the spanned bow of the chain on the Gypsy should at least be 90˚; this also goes for the hinged bow roller.

You might position the anchor windlass higher up, by means of a filler plate made of wood so as to comply to the demands. A possible circle on deck should also be

justified by means of a filler plate made of wood.

The only solution I have seen was one with my last boat. I could not keep all the chain in the locker under the windlass. I had extra chain off in another location that I manually pulled into the locker to let it out. I normally didn't need that much so it wasn't a huge deal. This is a serious problem you have to deal with. If you don't then the windlass won't work well at all.

[roverhi]

The chain can make a 90 degree turn below deck to get to a chain locker. The key is having enough depth in your chain locker so the vertical weight of the chain, after the 90, is enough to pull the chain through. I did it on our W32 as I wanted to store the chain under the vee berth but didn't want the hawse to run through the cabin. It worked with partial success. Could winch up the first 150' of 3/8" chain before the pile got too high and the vertical drop of the chain got too short. With the remaining 75', had to go below and knock the pile down and run back on deck to crank in another 25' or so and repeat the process. From memory, about 24", maybe less, of vertical drop on top of the pile of chain would pull the chain into the chain locker without my help.

The hawse pipe was 3" schedule 40 pvc. It went straight down from the windless for about 3' and then did a 90 degree turn and ran horizontal for about 18" before chain dropped into the chain locker.

Don't know if it would help but two 45 degree bends might work better if you were trying to move the chain a bit of a ways back from the windlass.

Aloha
Peter O.

[Wayne Kent]

In the case of your diagram, the 90 is directly adjacent to the capstan. This works because the capstan pulls the chain past the 90 when deploying the anchor and the weight of the chain drop into the locker does the same for the other direction. A 90 elsewhere needs the same kind of dynamic; otherwise it will be like trying to push a limp noodle.

Can you describe your situation clearer?

[craigsmith]

I'm a bit confused by what you mean by hawsepipe, as you and the other respondents seem to be talking about the chain-pipe between the windlass and chain locker. A hawsepipe is a vertical anchor stowage solution in the hull, as opposed to a bow roller...

To take things literally, if it's a new boat, and not a large commercial thing, then for goodness sake don't use a hawsepipe at all. What anchor are you planning on using?

Hawsepipes are intended for symmetrical anchors like Danforth and old Admiralty types, and you lose the ability to have any kind of sensible anchor type. That's fine on large boats where rollers aren't manageable and the anchor type isn't very important, but it's madness on small yachts.

Back to what I think you mean: Roverhi is correct in that a change in direction is perfectly fine, so long as there's enough weight from the chain to overcome the implicit friction. Use good rollers at each turn in the pipe, and it'll be fine. Peter has a chain-pipe that's approximately a meter long, a bit steeper than 45 degrees but with two rollers (vertical-to-angle from the windlass, then angle-to-vertical into the chain locker at the correct location). It works flawlessly.

I should get a photo of it; this is a common question.

[seafox]

I have a short stainless hawsepipe that I installed to stop water running across the underside of the deck and finding its way onto my wifes bed. We used to get a few drops when keeling in the strait and taking a few over the front. Now dry as Alan Wheeler's jokes.

[Alan Wheeler]

Oooo...thinking hard............nup. It'll have to wait

[Pblais]

It went straight down from the windless for about 3'

With three feet it can do everything and more as indicated by your success. The minimum drop you need is 30 CM or about 1 Foot. When it gets less than that the gypsy will skip when you haul in the rode. Our 33 ft boat used 10 mm chain and the drop was not very much. At exactly 1 ft of distance to the top of the cone it started to jump as expected (not desired). Anything that does not start with a straight drop of at least 12 inches will fail. Raising the windlass works but securing it to the deck gets a whole lot harder without a substantially wider base.

If it were to incline away from vertical the length of the inclined slide must become the hypotenuse of the triangle of a 12 inch fall so that the gravitational pull remains the same (even in New Zealand where gravity works backward). That does not include the friction from the surface of the incline. So you need a bit more. That works out to more than 20 inches for a 45 degree angle. Washing off the chain would be a serious requirement else it will "stick" to the slide. If you increase the drop you can shorten the incline to hit the desired spot. Since none of can re make a locker deeper you have to deal with it best you can or raise the windlass.

As you can see Peter's example when the drop is three feet it works well. 3 feet is really generous but given the friction not that generous. 2 feet might be on the edge of working.

[vacendak]

in New Zealand where gravity works backward

+1

2 craigsmith:
re: 'hawsepipe' - sure ! let's call this Through-Deck-Chain-Pipe (further on TDCP)
re: anchor type - am still thinking about it; SVB offers a good choise here: http://http://www.svb.de/index.php?s...ist&cnid=12703


STILL: I'll be more specific; this is a rough drawing of chain locker cross-section



the boat is cold-moulded diagonal plywood on an oak frame,
so I cannot allow chain falling directly on hull planking as it might be on fiberglass or steel boats;
have to make 2 built-in deep lockers similar to deep self-bailing cockpits
to have at least theoretical possibility to inspect the very forepeak of the boat
(fastenings, possible damages, etc) from inside, these lockers must be somehow "extractable" - in other words, windlass should NOT be positioned over the chainlocker;
a bent hawsepipe (TDCP) was the best I could imagine
will be really grateful for any alternative ideas

[Pblais]

in other words, windlass should NOT be positioned over the chainlocker;
a bent hawsepipe (TDCP) was the best I could imagine
will be really grateful for any alternative ideas

With a full meter to the top of the pile of chain it's no problem. I would lose the curve on the red lines. Make it straight and add a reverse curve at the bottom so the chain going out of the locker won't catch the lower edge of the pipe. The drawing makes the problem of catching on the way out far worse than it need be. Going in should be fine. Just be sure when all the chain is in the locker you still have at least a foot or more from the top of the pile to the pipe. The drawing makes the bottom of the locker look pretty small. Chain seems to pile up on a 60 degree slope as you pile it inside a locker so the problem of the chain coming in forming a cone is the problem you have to worry about.

[vacendak]

excuse me, I am not English-speaking, so I did not quite catch

Make it straight and add a reverse curve at the bottom

did you mean smthng like this

[Pblais]

No get rid of the bend to the left of the dashed line. The bend at the bottom is just to keep the chain links from catching the bottom of the pipe as you remove chain from the locker. The drawing does not need to bend much at all at the bottom. Just a little bit is all you need. Any bend is a place for the links to shift and get stuck.

Make sure the diameter of the pipe is more than one link. One link can rotate perpedicular to the pipe. In a bend it could cause it to hang up tight. Chain does not flow through a pipe easily.