Avioding capture by lobster buoy lines

[roger saunders]

Here on the beautiful coast of Maine, we have a challenge! Much of our coastal area is used for lobstering, and in places it appears that you could walk ashore stepping from buoy to buoy. Despite our best efforts, we snagged one last summer - and it was a real hassel cutting it free. If you encounter one, it will usually snag on the prop or the rudder.
Here is my idea. Run a small stainless steel cable from the trailing edge of the keel, horizontally, to the bottom forward corner of the rudder. The cable would be slightly slack with the rudder centered, and would gain about an inch more slack as the rudder went hard over. The presumption is that if we ran over a pot warp (line) it should usually slide down the keel, along the cable and off the back end of the rudder - and we sail happily on! Thats the theory anyway.
Has anyone had or heard of such a rig? If so, how did it work? Comments please.

Roger Saunders, Lively Lady

[roger saunders]

Thanks Ron,
I found the pivot point to be about 1 inch forward of the bottom forward corner of the rudder. To take the stress, I plan to fit a 1 1/2 in. wide band of sheet stainless steel around the rudder, about 1 in. up from the bottom, and hold it in place with epoxy and a couple of bolts. The bolt holes would be drilled oversize, filled with thick epoxy and redrilled. The cable/thimble would be attached to the ss band with a triangular ring of 1/4 in. ss rod.
Any other comments or ideas?

Roger

[jentine]

Roger,
Your idea is sound in principle, but it won't protect your prop from the pot warp.  The way traps are set leaves many extra feet of line for tides and seas so the buoy can be found (too short, it is dragged under in a sea or high tide).  At low tide, the buoy has 15 or 20 extra feet of line hanging.  It will snake around your wire and get you anyways.  A prop basket will keep the warp out of the screw, but will not help with the rudder.
A line from the hull to the rudder to close the gap at the pivot point will work.  Ten years ago I installed 1/4 section from the top edge of a 5 gallon bucket in front of the rudder.  I haven't picked up a pot since.  
Jim Kane

[reedbr]

The wire is an interesting idea.  However, wouldn't you have problems getting a sling in there to lift the boat out of the water for the season?

Also, on my old swing keel Catalina 22, the wire for the keel would hum when you really started moving.  It was tight light a piano wire though, and yours would be somewhat loose.

Down here in the Chesapeake we have the same problem, but with crab pots. I know a few folks who admit to having put cutters on their prop shaft, so it cuts what tries to wrap around the shaft.  Just don't let a waterman catch you destroying their pots.

C34 mkII "Ambitious"
Solomons, MD

[roger saunders]

Jim,
You may well be right about the prop snagging the pot warp, particularly with the engine running. My hope is that under most circumstances the buoy will slide along the hull, and tension on the pot warp will keep it relatively straight between the float and where it passes under the cable. Who knows!

Ambitious,
My yard doesn't think it will be a problem to get a sling around at haulout. Perhaps poke a line underneath, just ahead of the rudder, lead it forward, and use it to pull through the sling.

I'll post the results of my experiment at the end of the season - or sooner if it's a bust.
Any more comments or ideas?

Roger

[Tom P, IMPULSE #233, '86]

Instead of the wire idea (which does sound good), has anyone tried installing two small wooden (or stainless, aluminum, etc) dowels to the bottom of the hull, just forward of the rudder, and on each side of center (not very far from center)...The dowels should stick down about an inch past the gap which separates the hull from the rudder.

I have seen this setup on a couple of C-30's here on the Ches Bay and the owners said it works great (wooden dowels)...Anyway, I plan to add them to Impulse during the next haul-out...

Compared to my last boat, the C-34 hull/rudder design seems to be a real crap pot magnet...

[Tom Soko]

Tom,
I did exactly that on my '87 C36.  I put a 1/4"x4" SS bolt just forward of the gap between the hull and the rudder, on the centerline.  It's the kind that only has threads for the first inch or so, and it is angled back about 30 degrees.  Drilled a hole, screwed it in w/epoxy, and cut the head off.  So far it's worked very well. I'v snagged lobster pots on the rudder, but they didn't get jammed in the gap, and were easy to push off with a boat hook.

[Steve_in_lex]

Is a propeller guard feasible on a C34?  I've only heard of them on outboard motors or lobster boats.

[mainesail]

This idea has been around a while with some success but is far from fool proof, hell even full keels with props in an aperture catch pots..

The biggest problems are hauling, launching and swinging at anchor with lobster pots nearby. They tend to wrap the line as you swing thus requiring a dive to untangle it... My neighbor had keel to rudder line a few years ago on his Sabre. He no longer has one... His biggest complaint? They are seaweed magnets.....

There are only a few things that really work in Maine:

#1 Paying attention
#2 Paying attention
#3 Paying attention
#4 Understand how they are laid and how current and wind affect them
#5 Polarized glasses
#6 Luck

Beyond that Band-Aids solutions such as the hook-knife are about the best solution there is to avoid a swim. Line cutters often fail to cut and they can be deadly WHEN, NOT IF you have to dive.

Ask me how I know that!!!! Six stitches in my wrist just mm's from the radial artery!!! Yep you guessed it I NO LONGER HAVE A LINE CUTTER! In the cold water I never felt a thing yet I was bleeding profusely.....  

This is a Hinckley 43 (Ted Hood designed) with both Spurs and a keel to skeg line. It requires a diver in the spring and fall to connect and disconnect for haul & launch:

[Ken Juul]

#1 Paying attention
#2 Paying attention
#3 Paying attention
#4 Understand how they are laid and how current and wind affect them
#5 Polarized glasses
#6 Luck

Especially #4.  In the Chesapeake we don't have as big of tides to worry about, but it holds true.  Know what the current is doing and drive around them which is what 1-3 are all about.

[Stu Jackson]

Yes, pay attention.

HOOK KNIFE

http://forums.catalina.sailboatowners.com/showthread.php?t=131929&highlight=knife

[mainesail]

FWIW we sail about 1000nm to 1500nm per year in Maine and the Maritimes and in the last three years have not caught a single pot. I think this year I hit about 1350nm (not including deliveries of OPB's)..

The two most recent times were floating line and the one before that was a strong tide off the Kennebec River pulling all the pots under so that even with polarized glasses they could not be seen. That was the one where I sliced my wrist open because the "line cutter" FAILED TO CUT THE LINE, but DID CUT MY WRIST.......

It all comes down to pay attention..

I was at the fuel dock at Billings Marine this summer when a guy across from me from MD in a very expensive "blue water boat" snottily and smugly looked down his nose at our boat and said:

Him: "How many lobster pots do you catch per day on that spade rudder?"

Me: "Why have you caught any with your prop in the protected aperture?"

Him: "Only three since we've been in PenBay... I am a LICENSED CAPTAIN and never seen such a mess on the water as Maine has." (He made very sure to tell/brag about his "captains license" so everyone on the dock could hear him....)

Me: "How long have you been here?"

Him: "Three days. I imagine your boat must be a magnet for them.?"

Me: "I caught one two years ago but I live and cruiser here. How you sail amongst them makes a measurable difference over rudder type.."

Me: "What's that?" (pointing to a large three strand chunk of line on his bow that looked like a mooring pendant)

Him: "Oh that , I got a mooring pendant wrapped around my prop at Frenchboro Island and had to cut it free. The guy helping me accidentally popped my dinghy with his knife."  (accidentally for sure.;))

Me: "Well enjoy your trip to Maine, and watch out for those pots."

My Wife: "Holy expletive what a tool. That guy is unsafe and should not ever have come to Maine."

Me: "It takes all kinds I guess. He apparently knows all the answers but none of the questions.. Too bad his theory on spade vs. aperture didn't work out so well."

Old Man Working At Billings: "You know if it weren't for those type of folks we'd not have nearly as many boats to repair. Guys like him, are good for us."
(my wife, myself and the old guy on the dock all burst out laughing......)

[Albreen]

LOL, Mainesail! The comment at the end by the Old Man Working At Billings is absolutely priceless!