boat mooring

Jaybird · Newbie Joined: 12 Jan 2003 Posts: 40 City: Orlando

just wondering if anyone leaves their boat just tied up floating in the water. what kind of anchors and set ups are you using? i dont have a dock but i would like to keep my boat floating in the water near the shore. i just wanted to see what others are doing.

Ralph · Posted: Feb 24, 2003 12:05 am Post subject:

What sort of boat? You got to be careful leaving your boat in the water long term, gel coats not really designed to sit in the water for weeks on end.

Geoff Standish · Addict Joined: 13 Jan 2003 Posts: 843 City: Calgary

I don't see a problem doing that. Everyone around where we go does that. I've seen people use tires filled with cement, drum brakes of semi trucks, cinder blocks. Anything you can find that is heavy and will sink. You could probably buy one too. One thing to make sure of though. Buy a heavy duty line, and heavy duty connections to whatever you use to anchor. The line will be your weak point and you don't want your boat floating away. Take out the anchor every year and inspect it for damage. I've known afew people who's lines have broken, and thier boats floated away.

Good Luck

Jeff · Addict Joined: 13 Jan 2003 Posts: 678 City: Long Island

I have a 13 foot boston whaler, to moor it we use a 150 pound mushroom anchor, but this year we are switching to a 250 cuz we got it for free, then for the first 10 feet of line we use 1/2 inch chain the we switch to a smaller around 3/8. we connect the chains with swivel shackles then on the swivel shackles bolts we wire them to the chain so they cant come off without taking off the wire(if you dont do this the bolts can come undone).we have this all tied onto a mooring bouy with anouther swivel shackle and wire. then going from the mooring bouy to the boat we have 2 different 1/2 inch ropes, 1 has a clip on it (like the one on the winch of your trailer, and the outher has a loop on the end that we wrap around the bow cleat, the clip rope is shorter so that when teh boat goes over a wave the bow woulnt get sucked down into the wave, it just rides ontop of it, the looped rope has no tension on it but is their as a back up incase teh clip breaks.This probly seems like over kill but we have gotten some big squalls and the boat hasnt moved an inch and came threw the strom in perfect condition, i know you probly woulnt need all that but if you live on a big boddy of water id try a set up like mine
sorry for teh long post email me if you want some pictures of how i have my mooring set up or if you have any questions

jake · Posted: Feb 24, 2003 5:43 pm Post subject:

as far as leaving your boat in the water... it isn't a problem as long as you pull it every couple weeks to wash it off. Our gelcoat is white and we had no stains and no wear on it.

jake · Posted: Feb 24, 2003 5:44 pm Post subject:

as far as leaving your boat in the water... it isn't a problem as long as you pull it every couple weeks to wash it off. Our gelcoat is white and we had no stains and no wear on it.

bluefish86 · Posted: Feb 24, 2003 6:22 pm Post subject:

I have a few friends that leave their boats in the water all summer(5 months). As far as gel coat goes, it gets green and icky, but there's no damage done. There's a special coating stuff that you put on kinda like wax that makes it a lot easier to clean off in the fall.

I used to keep my old boat moored. For the anchor, I used a 40 gallon oil drum filled with concrete. It's over kill, but ther'e no way in hell it's gonna move anywhere. From that drum, I had galvanized steel chain(rated to over 5000 lbs) attached to a mooring buoy. I tied the boat to the buoy, and I had an extra cable I ran from the chain to the boat when I left it there for more than an hour or two.

mcfatty · Addict Joined: 13 Jan 2003 Posts: 725 City: Cookeville

you shouldn't leave your boat in the water more than 2 weeks at a time something called reverse osmosis. Blister your gel coat.

unlawfuly_assembled · Newbie Joined: 25 Jan 2003 Posts: 30 City: Kalamazoo, MI

If you leave your boat in the water for the whole summer, you should bottom paint your boat below the water line. That's what all the boats up in the Great Lakes do. Protects the hull and keeps crap from growing. There's special paint you should be able to get from a dealer or online.

bluefish86 · Posted: Feb 25, 2003 12:23 pm Post subject:

mcfatty, I think your wrong. I have friends who have left their boat in the water all summer for 20 years straight, without any gelcoat problems. Reverse osmosis is some used to filter water which requires pressure to be applied to one side, and does not happen by it self.

STUCKinIL · Newbie Joined: 26 Feb 2003 Posts: 1

Waiting to buy easment property that gave me waterfront access for a pier, I had to moore my Malibu behind my house on the Fox River, IL. I experimented alot with anchors that season and came up with a way to moor the boat that kept me from looking out the window at night to make sure my boat wasn't floating down stream. The waters are shallow at my house waist to chest high. We used clean pickle buckets, medium thick chain, shackles, combo lock and concrete. Here is how we put it together.

1. CUT FOUR EVEN LENGTHS OF CHAIN (almost as long as the depth of the water)

2. Then mix up some fast drying concrete. Fill each bucket with concrete mix about 1/4 full. Take each of the 4 chains and put undrwater end and some extrachain into the wet concrete.

3. Add remaining concrete to buckets and tie the chain to the pickel bucket Handle to keep the chains centered in the middle.

4. let dry

5. before attaching the chains together set buckets of concrete on bottom and push into the muck/sand. Float the ends of the chain by buoy. Connect the ends of chain using the shackl

6. Then attach last lenth of chain to the same shackle put a buoy to end so you don't have to dive for the chain. With same config you can bulid a aft mooring to make sure the the boat doesn't spin. use fast clip on the chain and use fast clip to attach to bow eye or combo lock

Never had a problem/never has moved and I still use it on rough days so my pier and boat don'tget banged up. I pull my boat and wash every 2 weeks. It is easy to forget and leave boat in, my neighbor got blisters on his centurion, and I won't chance it. Also the fish are using the underwater structure to hide and breed. CHeck Waterway rules...

Good luck
Scott

fs04laoaksfny · Posted: Feb 26, 2003 5:09 am Post subject:

up in mass where i go almost every single person leaves there boat in the whole year...Most of the boats still look great...sometimes they get stained but thats how it goes...

LickerPig · Criminal Joined: 05 Feb 2003 Posts: 62 City: Orlando, FL

When the water is low we moor our VLX. Depending on how windy your lake gets I would use 3-6 blocks. Better to use more than less. Make sure you put the mooring system out far enough because the bow always faces into the wind and you don't want to bury your prop.