anchor drag estimate for hunters

L

Lanlocked

New member
After the last trip to the beach I decided to find a way to deterine if my anchor was set and not dragging.
WE had a NW wind gusting to 25 MPH and the Resilient waged her tail 90* all night long. It took about 2 minutes for the boat to go from 0* to 90* off anchor.
I was worried that the anchor was going to pull.
I stayed up late trying to make bearings on the shore but I got tired and said Oh well.
Next time out I am going to bring my Laser range finder that I use for hunting. Lock on to a couple land targets and without a doubt I will know if I am hooked.
I couldn't hear the GPS anchor drag alarm if it was in Van Halen's amplifier once I am asleep.
I think it's a pretty cool way to tell if you are hooked.
Just another way of thinking outside the box.
 
You don't need a laser range finder--just a couple of compass bearings suffice--we do this every time we anchor--and have been doing it for over 60 years....
 
I use the raymarines gps anchor alarm all the time and it works well. Uses some battery but I have three so I dont worry about it. You can also use your cell phone with a app called Drag queen that works ok.

As for the swinging back and forth I have had a little luck with a sea anchor. I have also had a little luck letting out a lot more rode. other then that I dont see a way to stop a flat bottomed boat from swinging in the wind.
 
We use the raymarine anchor alarm or the garmin gpsmap anchor alarm. both have been reliable. To reduce the sailing at anchor I run a line from the anchor line to a breast cleat with enough tension to make a triangle with the boat as the hypotenuse, the anchor line to the knot point as one side, and the line from cleat to anchor line as the other side. This tends to have the boat skewed off of the anchor line and seems to reduce the sailing pretty well.
 
Another good way to tell if you're dragging is to keep your chartplotter on, zoomed way in. Your track will be a part of a circle centered on the location of the anchor, tracing and retracing as you swing back and forth. If you're dragging, you'll see the circular track being traced in a different place, further away from the original anchor position.

We often do this when we're anchored in strong wind or a more exposed location, sometimes watching for a while after anchoring to see if we're holding. If we're concerned about dragging where there's limited swing room, we keep the fishfinder on as well, so we can keep an eye on the depth.
 
There's a great APP developed by Active Captain called "Drag Queen". Have it on the iPad and could probably use it on the android phone too but haven't loaded it. It's free...

Charlie
 
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