Anchor Trip Line

[NormMessinger]

How does one handle the trip line to keep things from getting all tangled up while stored and as it is being deployed. One source suggested tying it to the rode with easily broken string so it can be pulled free if needed.

[Donn]

If you aren't using a float, you can use floss to tie the tripline to the rode. If you are using a float, keep the tripline, float and counterbalance stowed until you are ready to anchor, and just clip the line to the anchor's tripline eye (assuming the CQR).

[Ian McColgin]

Oy, the floss seems like work.

I have a few bits of spare yellow poly with longish ( 10+ tucks) well whipped eye splices at each end. Put enough on the crown of the anchor with a shackle and maybe a float on the other end and ease it over from the side opposite the one you're easing the rode out from.

[Gresham CA]

When I've used one it was like Donn said. (CQR)

Sorry Norm I just re-read your question. It was stored in a mesh bag so it could dry and wound up like you would do your jib sheets.

[ 06-10-2003, 02:29 PM: Message edited by: Gresham CA ]

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

DON'T USE A TRIP LINE!!!!

They are a recipe for all sorts of troubles; they lovingly entwine themselves round all sorts of stuff; if you tie them back to the rode the lowest tie won't break when it's twenty feet under water so the tripline won't work. If you use a buoy it will end up in the strangest places....I could go on...

Here is a much better trick, which I got out of Eric Hiscock and have used for thirty years, on the very rare occasions that I have fouled a CQR.

Get a short length of chain - about a foot or so -and a shackle that will go through it to make a loop. Carry this with you and know where it is. You won't want it for years.

When your CQR really has hooked a ground chain or whatever, haul as taut as you can on the rode. Shackle the loop of chain round the rode with a strong line on it and drop it down.

Now slack off the rode, as abruptly as you can.

Haul on the line attached to the loop of chain, and up comes the CQR. It's one of the reasons why I love these anchors.

What has happened is that the loop of chain has dropped over the vertical shank of the anchor. When you slack the rode off the shank returns to horizontal (if you have a decent bit of chain at the business end of the rode) and the line attached to the loop of chain will now pick up the CQR by its point of balance, opposite to the small eye in the head, lifting the plough part clear of the obstruction.

DO, however, have a length of line - about a fathom or a bit more - permanently shackled to the eye on the back of the head. This is a dodge developed by Professor Taylor who invented the CQR - it is a convenient way of dropping the anchor - drop it over the bow and keep the line round something with a slippery hitch until you want it - and recovering it - get the anchor in sight and fish for the line with a boathook and up it comes without trying to bite you!

[Ian McColgin]

Andrew is right, as ever. On Goblin I always used the fathom or so of line as I did not have a way of housing the CQR on a roller. Dropped that habit on Grana as the anchors stow nicely.

I also know that the chain on a bight works as that's just what we did the only time I had to recover a badly fouled CQR.

I have dropped trips from time to time, especially around the Boston Harbor Islands and down along Maine, but not actually had to use one in a difficult recovery. Mostly, the line and float are there to let me yell at folk who are about to drop their hook on top of mine.

One of the more amusing annoyances of a trip line is when some lazy cruiser picks it up thinking it's a mooring. . .

I like the floating and highly visible yellow poly for this use but recommend not using much more than you need in any anchorage as it floats around the surface is a bit of a clot. Sometimes I've put a bit of weight about two fathoms down just to diminish this problem.

Different boats, different longsplices.

[Smacksman]

Another handy problem mooring fingy I carry around is a small grapnell welded up from scrap half inch steel bar with a large eye on it formed to take a running line so that the line can be slipped and the grapnell sacrificed.

The grapnell can be drudged onto old lines, chain, cables, etc. to lift them off the bottom while the recovery methods described by members above are employed.

They also make good presents for a boat that otherwise has everything!

[MAGIC's Craig]

Norm, we would also recommend against a rigged trip line based on past experience.

We were sailing off the the hook on a sudden-lee shore one dark and crappy night, with a trip line and bouy rigged to our cutter's CQR (mistake #1). Our trip line was a non-floater (mistake #2) and it looped down as the hook came off the bottom. The bight snagged a rock, whipped us handily about and onto the beach we went. After recovering the anchor and cutting the trip line, I towed us (slightly) off with the dinghy, Vicky raised sails and we escaped.

Since that time, we have limited ourselves to a short line off the crown as described by Andrew. We use this line to help haul the anchor further out(and up) the bobstay when stowing for sea.

[Scott Rosen]

I've never used a tripline, and I don't see any reason to start.

[J. Dillon]

Back when I had a cruising sail boat I started reguraly used one after fouling the anchor on old mooring chain or what ever the anchor got caught on. It sure came in handy. I found out it better to make em out of wood ( it floats) paint it high visability orange and burn in or carve it's purpose, Like "anchor buoy" . An old clorox bottle just wouldn't do. When hit by a prop it's gone.

Many times when anchoring out off the ICW I'd be trying to pick up sunken trees etc. but the trip line saved the day.

During the Statue of liberty rededication in 86 I think. I saw one guy bring up a huge tree his anchor fouled on right behind Liberty island.
:eek:
JD