Snubber for Mahalo

[rgano]

Yeah, that cleat is good for holding temporary loads like maybe just the weight of an anchor while shifting rodes or some other "admin" function. I would NEVER use it (I have one just like it in the same position) to do something like break an anchor free of the bottom. That's what you use the hawse holes and Sampson post for. The construction of my boat is so light and flimsy that I don't actually trust a single cleat on the boat for any serious loading, but that's the price for light and fast.

 

[dhays]

I think your cleat is an 8” heavy duty Sea Dog cleat. That cleat uses 4 x 1/4” through bolts for mounting. I am sure that there is a materials engineer on TF that could tell you how strong they would be.

I think the ultimate strength will be determined by how strong the material is that the cleat is bolted to as well as quality of the installation. Large washers or a backing plate would make that cleat plenty strong. It would be good to get some idea of the strength of the bolts and mounting, but if I had to make a guess, I think it would be plenty strong for your purposes. You certainly don’t want to count on the guess of an ignorant sailor however.

The idea is to use it as an attachment point for a snubber. As such, the cleat will not be subject to large snatch loads. Anchoring, you will have first chain catenary, then the stretch of a snubber to reduce the shock loads.

However, if you were anticipating any heavy wind, I’d be using the hawse holes and a bridle.

 

[FlyWright]

Update. The commissioning guys grabbed a couple of cleats from Fisheries. This is a large cleat, 8". For this application, I feel the mounting holes are "tiny." Looks like it would take a 1/4" bolt, not sure, I didn't measure.

But I just don't like the feeling of a cleat we install here being the interface between 500 or more pounds of anchor/chain and 120,000 lbs of boat.

If I had it to do over again I would have the factory add a Samson post.

So I'm going to go back to the dual snubber idea since I have great hawse holes with integrated cleats.

Looks like it just might be appropriately sized for my boat but definitely not for yours. What were they thinking?