# Mooring ball heads up!!



## Maine Sail (Jan 6, 2003)

Hi All,

It has come to my attention over the last few years that the new "hard shell" mooring balls where the pendant connects to the top run a significantly higher risk of the pendant wrapping the chain than previously thought.

Today in winds of 18-30 knots I counted no less than 7 "hard shell" balls with the pendants wrapped around the chain.

I watched this happen the other night in calm weather and my observation is as follows.

In calm weather the boat swings around the ball and the pendant goes slack. The pendants then gets caught under the ball and wraps the chain. If the boat continues to move around the ball it can wrap three or four times! I observed two things that could or are causing this:

#1 The mooring ball sits too high in the water due to either a light top chain or too big a ball for the weight of the chain and it makes it easy for the pendant to get "under" the "equator" of the ball and then when the boat yanks the pendant it shoots straight down under the ball instead of up and over it.

Heavier chain and or a smaller ball better matched to the chain weight at low tide would get the ball sitting lower int the water and may minimize this occurrence.

#2 Any pendant coming off the top of the ball should have floats laced about 12" to 16" apart, out to about 4 feet or so ,so the pendant can not sink under the ball in calm conditions. This would only work with a "low floating" ball and even with floats some still wrap high floating balls.

I took this picture of my neighbors boat this a.m.. I tried un-successfully in 18-30 knots to untangle it but it had wrapped twice.. It would not have taken much more wind to chafe and snap these dual pendants..

I think a large swivel about two feet bellow the ball would let the pendant un-twist from the chain if this happened. My pendant connects under the ball to the top of a 1" swivel and in the last 13 years my pendant has never once wrapped the chain.

I'm having a tough time seeing any benefit to a through the ball set up based on what I've witnessed over the last three years. From a severely scratched brand new Awlgrip job from the top shackle rubbing the hull to LOTS of pendant wrapping of the chain I'm perplexed as to the benefit..?.

Just a heads up!!


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## bubb2 (Nov 9, 2002)

Great Post! Across the Hudson river from here I have a slip, is a 300 boat mooring field. I was not that many years ago, Tappan Zee bridge 4, Nyack Boat Club 0. That was score after boats broke lose in storms. All the mooring lines showed sings of chafe.


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## lbdavis (Apr 23, 2007)

Another great post, Halekai. Thanks.

The only beni I see to the "on top" mooring balls is keeping one's pendant(s) high and dry and thus free of a slime beard. 

Hardly seems worth it.


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## Maine Sail (Jan 6, 2003)

lbdavis said:


> Another great post, Halekai. Thanks.
> 
> The only beni I see to the "on top" mooring balls is keeping one's pendant(s) high and dry and thus free of a slime beard.
> 
> Hardly seems worth it.


Yes but only when you're actually ON the mooring. When you go off sailing for two weeks the pendant gets just as dirty as mine...

I think the premise is that you can see the shackle and pendant thimble. I can see mine fine when I pull it up above water and do my spot checks....

Again this was just a heads up for those with through the ball mooring set ups..


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## lbdavis (Apr 23, 2007)

halekai36 said:


> Yes but only when you're actually ON the mooring. When you go off sailing for two weeks the pendant gets just as dirty as mine...


It doesn't take 2 weeks in Casco Bay, does it?!?  

Halekai, Were you up the Royal River at Yankee this week? I thought I saw that beautiful blue on a drive by the other day...


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## JimsCAL (May 23, 2007)

Very interesting. Great info! I guess this is one of the few cases where bigger is not necessarily better with regard to mooring/anchoring hardware. I have always used inflatable mooring balls with the attachment at the bottom. Never gave much thought to it, but you just convinced me to continue using them.


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## Maine Sail (Jan 6, 2003)

lbdavis said:


> It doesn't take 2 weeks in Casco Bay, does it?!?
> 
> Halekai, Were you up the Royal River at Yankee this week? I thought I saw that beautiful blue on a drive by the other day...


No my boat has been on her mooring in either Broad Cove in Cumberland or on her mooring in Falmouth since early May.. Where is your boat? Did you check out Kaza Auto Electric for your alternator? Where do you keep your boat are you in SoPo..


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## JohnRPollard (Mar 26, 2007)

Helekai,

Good post. I tend to agree with you about the through-the-mooring-ball attachment system. Ours is set up that way, and this year I added a series of floats to the pennant for exactly the reasons you described.

By the way, I considered purchasing bonafide pennant floats from Hamilton, but I was feeling thrifty that day and took another approach. We have about half a dozen "swim noodles" that we use for floating on when we swim off the boat. They are long (about 4-5 feet) foam tubes, with a hollow core. We buy them for about 99 cents on sale. I took one of those, cut off six-inch lengths with a serrated bread knife, then sliced each length longitudinally on one side, down to the hollow core. I slid about half a dozen of these on to the mooring pennant, spaced about every foot or so. I put two wraps of duct tape onto each float and voila.

Not the most ship-shape or fancy approach, but each float costs about 15 cents. So far they have held up well and served their purpose.


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## Maine Sail (Jan 6, 2003)

John,

I've seen that done. I happen to have Hamilton five minutes away though.

I use one "Seine Net Buoy" for bellow the water to hold the shackles in place then about six of the "White Oval Floats" ($1.41 each) for above water to float the pendants....


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## KindOfBlue (Nov 22, 2005)

We had on a mooring with the pennants on the bottom last year. On two different occasions one of the pennants chafed through under the mooring ball. I figured that barnacles & abrasive chain/shackle on the bottom of the ball were the cause and if they attached on the top, we would have better chances.


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## Maine Sail (Jan 6, 2003)

KindOfBlue said:


> We had on a mooring with the pennants on the bottom last year. On two different occasions one of the pennants chafed through under the mooring ball. I figured that barnacles & abrasive chain/shackle on the bottom of the ball were the cause and if they attached on the top, we would have better chances.


Chris,

You need floats on the pendant and a SWIVEL connected as show in the Hamilton Marine diagram or you WILL wrap & chafe. I'm going on 13 years with this configuration and I have yet to have my pendants wrap the chain and I have never had any chafe bellow water.

I run my Yale pendants three seasons before replacing and they usually still look fine though somewhat faded..

Moorings are a system and all pieces have to work together floats, swivels, shackles and pendants..


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## JohnRPollard (Mar 26, 2007)

halekai36 said:


> John,
> 
> I've seen that done. I happen to have Hamilton five minutes away though.
> 
> I use one "Seine Net Buoy" for bellow the water to hold the shackles in place then about six of the "White Oval Floats" ($1.41 each) for above water to float the pendants....


Yeah, those buoys are not unreasonably priced. In my case, I also wanted to get the job done NOW, so the thrifty approach was also more expedient than waiting for an order to be delivered 3-5 days later.

Must be nice living so close to Hamilton!


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## Joel73 (Apr 23, 2007)

Our pendant connects under the ball to a swivel on the chain... i figure that it doesn't twist (around the ball) this way and i also cut a "link" out of the system by only using the ball as a float, not as a connection point. It gets fouled faster but....


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## Valiente (Jun 16, 2006)

I like suggestion number two particularly...if the pendant "stands off", you can't have the problem.

We use old tires that barely break the surface, with the moor running up the "hub" (and a chain running to an old railcar wheel as the actual moor!) Not a problem, but the mooring ball is far more common a method.


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## steelboat (Dec 28, 2007)

Halekai, in our harbor they're trying to move everyone to a thru the ball system, because there have been many problems with swivels not swiveling when they're supposed to, and pennants chafing thru... in fact we lost a J-40 last week for just that reason. The boat came to rest , upright, on a gently sloping rocky beach, balancing gracefully on her winged keel. The owner (a friend of ours; I sailed this boat Marion-Bermuda) got the call at 6:20 AM... your boat's on the rocks... and went racing down to the harbor to find her sitting there, upright and undamaged. They propped her up with boat stands (gently) and waited for the tide to come back, when they got her off. Amazing that she didn't damage herself or anyone else on her way through the mooring field. 
I have a thru the ball system, and found that with floats and heavy carpet duct taped around the big shackles and thimbles, the top sides stay clean and the pennants don't wrap, but without both, they do. 
Best, Bob S/V Restless


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## radly53 (Dec 25, 2006)

I have a hard thru ball system setup with lots of flots on the pennants. it works well and this the second year with it. But the big problem is when its calm or the wind and tide is opposed the ball bangs and its very disturbing.its like someone with a hammer smacking your boat at the water line.
More than once my wife has had me up on deck at 3 or 4 putting fenders over the bow, to stop the banging. It dose not work!
I m planning to go back to a soft ball next year.

Sea Fever
Bristol 29.9 #49
Falmouth, Maine


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