Picking up a mooring ball.

[DaveJ]

I have done this probably 15 times in the 15 years that we have been sailing, but last weekend didn’t turn out well. In front of our club, on the Niagara River, the current is 3-4 kts. That day the wind was gusting 15-20 kts, certainly not ideal. We made our plan, pulled up to the ball so it was at the side of the boat (barely reachable) and I snagged it with the boat hook. After a lot of wrestling I got the line through the eye of the ball and attempted to move up the deck to the bow. But the wind was not cooperating, somehow I ended up with a bad rope burn on my forearm.
I have been asking for pendants to be attached to the balls, but our club is worried about liability. Some of our members go out in their dinghy, attach the floating pendant then take their sailboat out.
So, what does everyone else do? These mooring balls are mostly for guests, but the members use them some times. I’m not sure how an inexperienced guest would ever be able to accomplish this.
Do any clubs/marinas supply and maintain mooring ball pendants?
Thanks
dj

 

[DaveJ]

See above post.

 

[kappykaplan]

Ouch!!

 

[Don S/V ILLusion]

Having a CC boat, picking up a ball can be an interesting experience. After having a few misses, I found the world’s largest snap shackle of all places at a yard sale supposedly “off a Russian trawler”. Sales pitch aside, I attached a 6 ft lanyard to the snap and a long line spooled out to the bow so when I catch the ring, it’s an easy walk to the bow cleat.

Pisses off the boat boys in the islands but works great.

 

[danm1]

You need a Kong mooring hook

Amazon.com

 

[Rick Webb]

You need something like this

377 Snap Hook Clip for Boat Hooks - Lifesaving Systems

SEA-DOG SEA-DOG BOAT HOOK MOORING BUOY SNAP SPARE KEEPER PLATE ONLY - 491056-1 | Boats.net

I think these are listings for the brackets not the whole assembly

 

[BarryL]

Hello,

My sailing club and yacht club have moorings in multiple locations for members use. All of them have pendants attached. The pendants do get pretty gross with marine life. I rarely put the pendant on my bow cleat, instead I just loop a short line through the pendant and cleat the line to the bow.

I suggest you add pendants to the moorings. So much easier. Pull up to mooring, grab pendant with boat hook, Push line through eye and cleat to bow cleat.

Good luck,
Barry

 

[DaveJ]

Thanks Barry, this is what a few of us at our club are trying to do, but meeting resistance.
Rick W, how do you get the hook off of the ball when you have high freeboard?
Cheers

 

[BC Bernie]

I pickup mooring balls often, singlehanded. Most mariners use the conventional way of attaching from the bow, thus requiring a boat hook and a lot of athletic arm reaching, and precision steering and speed analysis. The easier way I find, is to bring a long bow line right to the cockpit (outside of the lifelines of course), to the primary winch (thus forming a bridle), then to motor or sail along side the ball. Once you lasso over the mooring ball, you are secured. Now you can take your time to adjust however you want. You can use the winch to bring your boat closer to the ball (very handy during a blow), or you can position the boat and then detach the line from the winch and place it through the eye on mooring ball, or even use a separate secondary line to secure your boat. I haven't used my boat hook in years.

 

[Rick Webb]

Thanks Barry, this is what a few of us at our club are trying to do, but meeting resistance.
Rick W, how do you get the hook off of the ball when you have high freeboard?
Cheers

That is the tough part. The best solution I have found is a piece of PVC pipe over your line, slide that forward to release the catch on the hook and wiggle the hook off of the eye.

 

[Stu Jackson]

Our buoys here in BC have big, floppy rings. I attach a long dock line to the bow cleat and run it outside the stanchions, pick up the ring - usually from the cockpit or midships, slide the line through and walk it to the bow. I do this single handed. The buoy should be down wind of the boat. I see altogether too many couples or groups balanced precariously on the bow of their boats trying to grab a buoy which is further away because the bow is so much higher than midships or the cockpit.

 

[danm1]

Our buoys here in BC have big, floppy rings. I attach a long dock line to the bow cleat and run it outside the stanchions, pick up the ring - usually from the cockpit or midships, slide the line through and walk it to the bow. I do this single handed. The buoy should be down wind of the boat. I see altogether too many couples or groups balanced precariously on the bow of their boats trying to grab a buoy which is further away because the bow is so much higher than midships or the cockpit.

I wonder about having the buoy downwind and the possibility of running over it and tangling?

 

[Stu Jackson]

I wonder about having the buoy downwind and the possibility of running over it and tangling?

The boat just rotates around the buoy. The buoy has big heavy chain holding it down from underneath the buoy.

 

[dlochner]

When picking up a mooring, whether it has a pendant or not, we will use a long dock line attached at one end to a cleat, bring the boat alongside and upwind of the bouy and amidships. Grab the ring or the pendant and insert the line. This will give you some time as the boat drifts back. Cleat the bitter end. Once secured, an additional line can be run through the pendant or buoy ring and the longer line can be adjusted to reduce the swing circle.

The standard procedure down south on the ICW is to have mooring buoy with a 1" pendant attached to the buoy. The boat then picks up the pendant and runs 2 lines through the eye on the pendant and cleat them. Some mooring fields make it easier by adding a pick-up stick.

Here's an example of the commercial mooring pendants.

Departments - NEW ENGLAND ROPES MOORING PENDANT POLY/NYLON DOUBLE BRAID

New England Ropes Poly/Nylon mooring pendants combine the strength and elasticity of nylon in the core with tough, durable abrasion resistant polyester in the cover. Poly/Nylon mooring pendants come standard with a thick yellow-tinted marine-tech coating that improves abrasion resistance and...

shop.hamiltonmarine.com