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Old 01-04-2016, 12:51 PM   #27
caltexflanc
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City: North Carolina for now
Join Date: Aug 2011
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Quote:
Originally Posted by makobuilders View Post
Perhaps this poll is biased because the majority of the responders use windlasses? The guys with captive reel winches generally use all nylon with a chain leader, or sometimes wire rope. I spent some time on a friend's 100 footer with the stockless anchor snugged up in the hawser hole, and he still used nylon on a reel. A great number of commercial fishermen use the reel with nylon and those guys use their boats a lot more than the average pleasure cruiser.

So Mr. READY2GO, perhaps the poll should be expanded to be more accurate.
Those commercial fishing guys rarely anchor, for one thing, and rarely for more than a day, if that.

All chain is chosen for several reasons, all of them practical. To name but a few:

1) the weight makes for a heavier catenary and thus a more gentle motion at anchor under normal conditions. 2) the chain is not subject to chafing on the sea bottom and the various hard object thereon; between that and stress a rope rode will be more short lived 3) the chain can bury and settle into mud and sand deeply; it is not uncommon for the boat to lie to the chain, not the anchor (ever wonder about one reason why an anchor may come up backwards sometimes?), again making for a gentler motion, and less horsing.
Heck, I see this phenomena on the short lengths of chain we use on the Whaler.

If you are a weekend warrior or rarely anchor, I don't see the necessity of an all chain rode. But for full time cruising across a variety of geographies, involving multi-day anchorages and the inevitable sporty conditions I wouldn't be without it .
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