Small world, yes I have spent several years as an air traffic controller at the busiest airport in the world (that being KATL) but alas now I am just the lowly Air Traffic Manager at Pensacola ATCT/TRACON in Florida...with my 26M parked in front of my ICW condo 7 months out of the year!
I don't suggest using the D ring as the boat swing while on the buoy can cause side loads on D ring, bending it
and/or breaking/deforming it and possibly damaging the hull.
I've used 3/4' 3-strand nylon line for 4 years with little wear and no problems. I use a single line from the stbd cleat, going through the anchor roller to
a swivel shackle on the mooring anchor chain. The line is protected from chafe with a section of hose. There seems to be only small side loads on
the anchor roller.
I'm located on a river where the wind is usually contrary to the current.
Gavman, I'm a newbie too but have been lurking on this site for a few months. I kept my X on a swinging mooring in Poole Harbour all last year and simply looped the main chain through the bow roller and round both cleats then padlocked the chain to one of the cleats. No problems with it all year. Make sure you secure your motor though, I had my 50hp Yamaha stolen off the back of the from the swinging mooring. No damage to the boat, they carefully uncoupled all the controls and took off with it. Not sure how they managed it, 110Kg of engine with the boat floating in 8feet of water. The police said this was a small engine for them and thya have had 250Hp engines taken from moored boats here.
PEN24 wrote:Gavman, I'm a newbie too but have been lurking on this site for a few months. I kept my X on a swinging mooring in Poole Harbour all last year and simply looped the main chain through the bow roller and round both cleats then padlocked the chain to one of the cleats. No problems with it all year. Make sure you secure your motor though, I had my 50hp Yamaha stolen off the back of the from the swinging mooring. No damage to the boat, they carefully uncoupled all the controls and took off with it. Not sure how they managed it, 110Kg of engine with the boat floating in 8feet of water. The police said this was a small engine for them and thya have had 250Hp engines taken from moored boats here.
Hi PEN24, thats very interesting - thank you - thats what i would like to do, couple of questions though if you dont mind, what gauge chain did you use for your loop as i will need to change mine as the current chain is hefty for the old centaur and too bug for the Mac. Sorry to hear about your outboard - its one of my biggest fears and i have been looking for a security device to try and prevent this. do you use anything to lock the outboard now i would be very grateful if you could post any device that you have found or do you use a manual method that you have devised?
Don't know the guage of the chain - it is whatever comes with the mooring but the links are about 2" long I think. I simply "hooked" a link to the horn on each cleat and padlocked it in position. The old engine was locked on using a decent locking bolt but they must have sawn it off or something. At least it was a clean job and no damage was done to the boat. This happened in June and I spent the rest of the summer using a 1967 20Hp Johnson that I got off ebay for £107! Not much fun but at least I managed to use the boat for the rest of the season.
I have since bought a new engine and will be installing it over the winter. My current ideas for security are:
A heafty chain or security cable round the engine and running all along the boat to the mooring chain where it will be padlocked on.
Datatagging
Possibly fitting a tracking device
Fitting an alarm - not much use but it might at least alert someone nearby.
Incidentally there have been thefts of just the lower leg off decent outboards in poole Harbour so I also intend to run a chain (in a plastic hose) round the leg and secure it to the engine.
What a shame you have to go to these lengths to secure what you already own!
With regard to an alarm, I believe that you can buy an alarm which will trigger a SIM card type device, which will then ring a designated number. I did some market research on this some years ago for a lockup garage, but didn't need it in the end, trawl Google and see what is out there.
I don’t want to worry you, but I met a motor boat owner who had two 60 hp Yamaha’s stolen from the back of his boat in Pool, The police told him he was lucky they broke the locks if they cannot get the engine off easily they cut the transom out with a chain saw. - Just make sure you have good insurance.
