DROGUES AND SEA ANCHORS

Like I said I am new to the forum.

A little history

I have been reading every thing I can find on sailing, as a long time dream of mine is finally going to come true.

We have sold the fishing boat and I am retiring, and in a year will start my social security.

We are in the prcess of looking for a boat to do some serious criusing.

Back to the subject of drougs, the coast guard at Astoria, Oregon did some vary intensive testing, this was a two year study off of the Columbia river bar in severe winter conditions. And believe me the conditions there can be horrible. In a storm you can feel the effects of the Columbia river over 50 miles off shore.

I will see if I can find that and post a link here.

Dennis

Para Anchor- personal experience

We found ourselves grazed by a typhoon south of Japan on a transpac journey. 70kts plus and mountainous seas. Deployed a 24' diameter Para-tech sea anchor on 600' of 3/4" braid. This held us bow-to for over 36 hours at a drift rate of 0-.2kts as per our two GPS's.

Best defence, of course is to avoid the storm. Plan B included the Sea Anchor. Secured it to the mast and used plenty of chafe gear.

Chafe turned out to be our biggest problem through the night and following day. If there's a next time, I've built a chain bridle to attach to the 550' of rode.

IMO these anchors work.

Bruce

SV Trionos- Hong Kong

[Jack Tyler]

Bruce, please tell us how you would set up the chain bridle at the bow. Some detail about the bow and its hardware as well as the attachment plan would be useful info. You certainly can't have chafe with chain; it will saw off parts of the boat.

Jack

[Didereaux]

I would rather know exactly what type of boat it was used on, it's keel type, its lines, displacement etc. Sea anchors work for some and not others, the only reason can be the boat.

The Pardeys swear by these things, but set them on a bridle such that they are angled, yet other boats are unable to stabilize this way because they are far different style from the Pardeys Hess boat.

So, give me the boats data and the exact method of deployment, then and only then can I or anyone else begin to evaluate its possible usefullness for my situation.

[Didereaux]

I believe this is the link to the Coast Guard drogue tests.

http://www.sailrite.com/drogue_information.htm

g'Luk

http://www.sailrite.com/drogue_information.htm

[Swagman]

Originally Posted by name='Converted Post'

Originally posted by Didereaux

I would rather know exactly what type of boat it was used on, it's keel type, its lines, displacement etc. Sea anchors work for some and not others, the only reason can be the boat.

Surely all the options (para anchor / drogue / hove to / running away) will work to some extent - but it's a question of which works most effectively in the given situation for the design of yacht?

In my opinion, until such time as one can get four equal boats all skippered by the similar qualified people in the same bit of ocean at the same time and all using one of the differing methods, we'll never be able to say for sure what really is best. That's the kind of gear / practical test a yachting magazine should take on - I'm sure it would be appreciated by all readers!

I personally find it hard to put my faith in the methods used by Lyn / Larry Pardy as they sailed a much more traditional designed yacht than we do. As todays typical cruiser designs are vastly different designs - and alternative methodologies have equally proved to have worked by other experienced sailors - I'm not sure a sea anchor is best for everyone.

If anyone out there has positive experence using a sea anchor on a medium / light displacement monohull I'd love to hear about it and maybe modify my own preferences to run away before bad weather.

Cheers

JOHN

[Jack Tyler]

Dennis, congrats on moving from one form of work (fishing) to another (cruising).<g> Given your plans, I'd encourage you to come over to the SSCA website if you're not already a member, familiarize yourself with its services and especially to visit the Discussion Board, which is populated by a significant percentage of long-term full-time cruising sailors. There are other useful boards to visit as well, including this one...but the resources at the SSCA Board coupled with the very useful content in their CD containing 10 years of their monthly Bulletins from cruisers all over the world would be a very useful - and inexpensive - resource for you during your boat search and subsequent cruising.

Website: ssca.org

Discussion Board: http://ssca.org/sscabb/index.php

CD and other publications: available in Member's Section

Jack

Para-anchor Personal experience

Re-my previous post: For our yacht, during the typhoon we were in south of Japan, our para-anchor worked as advertised and we wouldn't leave home without one in future. Ours is a 50' sloop, fin keel, 28000lb displ. We have read and seen most of Pardy's material on the subject and found the bridle he suggested was useless. Our furled headsail seemed to cause the bow to fall off the wind and in doing so kept us yawed as we drifted slowly very slowly. This did create the 'slick' the Pardy's speak off without the constant attention to a second bridle. As mentioned we used 600' of nylon braid, securred to the mast and run through the anchor roller (pinned- to prevent the rope from jumping out.) Used sections of old fire hose as chafe guards but chafe still became enemy # one.

In the conditions we were in, it was impossible the see the marker buoy indicating the chute position. We therefore never adjusted the rode to any changing wavelength there may have been.

I have now built a chain bridle secured to our two bow cleats using large snubbers. Two short chains (4')into a D ring, then attached to a longer 30' chain run through the anchor roller and pinned. This is then attached to 550' of rode. This has been tested rough south china sea conditions and we found very little movement through the roller.

I can only comment on what has worked for our sloop, in a rather untidy storm. Hope some of this info helps.

Bruce

[Jack Tyler]

There is currently a helpful thread on this topic at the SSCA Discussion Board - http://ssca.org/sscabb/index.php?action=vt...um=6&topic=2309 To quote from one very experienced contributor: "First, [the Pardeys] also have an extremely full keel and no roller furling which both help. Second, they use different technique (the bridle) than the manufacturers primarily suggest (straight over the bow). The bridle technique is even more difficult to implement on a biggish boat – there is no stock snatch block available that is strong enough to handle the loads so you need to use a somewhat different approach (a spliced bridle) and finding chafe free/strong enough attachment points for this bridle (which can take loads of about 75% of displacement) is difficult." BTW this was from a fellow who spend a good deal of time in the Chelian Canals with the Pardeys and discussed all this with them.

For those who have access to the USA's Cruising World magazine, there are two excellent articles by Beth Leonard in the Dec issue on rigging, deploying and recovering a drogue, and on forereaching & heavying to as storm tactics. These are excellent because Beth and her partner Evans (the fellow I quoted above) have sailed many miles in the Southern Ocean and elsewhere and so their experience base is deep. This becomes clear when the describe how all these techniques vary considerably in their influence on the boat, just as Bruce points out, because the boats themselves vary so greatly (let alone the sea conditions).

To modify something John stated, drogues (both low speed and medium speed) have a very different purpose than a chute anchor. One carries them for different reasons and so it's not a simple matter of which of the three you pick from, altho' that's in fact often what happens.

John, because you said "If anyone out there has positive experence using a sea anchor on a medium / light displacement monohull I'd love to hear about it..." I encourage you to get a copy of Victor Shane's Drag Device Data Base (ed. 4 or later) which is filled with first-hand accounts of using all 3 devices, by vessels varying in side, # of hulls, and rigs. I find those accounts to be extremely provocative for me in ID'ing issues and thinking through choices. I'm sure you would, too.

Jack

[Steady Hand]

2014 Thread About Drogues in Storm Tactics

Howdy folks!

I just came across this old (started in 2005, last post in 2006) thread about Sea Anchors and Drogues. I read it with interest, as it is a good topic regarding seamanship. However, it does seem to be a bit dated (most of the links provided do not work).

Before finding this thread, I started a different one on similar topic. I have included working links to USCG reports on use of Drogues at sea (the US Coast Guard did extensive testing of various designs of drogues including parachute and cone and series styles).

I encourage you to look over the linked USCG report and to read it carefully. Some of the results of their testing were critical to see. In short, very important info for sailors whose lives may depend on the use of a device like this.

Here is a link to the JUNE 2014 thread I started on this topic (Storm Tactics: Sea Anchors vs. Drogues). The link is to a thread on THIS site (CL).

http://www.cruiserlog.com/forums/f12...ogue-8401.html