Anchor 'topping out' on roller furler

[Wayne]

I noticed this weekend that when bringing my delta anchor back aboard that the shank rammed into the bottom of the roller furler drum.  I remember some discussion of this, but forget what solution, if any, others had come up with.
Thanks in advance for your responses!

[Jeff_McKinney]

Wayne,

I've got the same type of anchor but have not had issues with whacking the drum (yet).

The problem I have encountered is bringing it in a bit too fast and having the end of the shank wind up rotated and not feeding or hanging up on the metal loop at the end of the roller. I've had good luck using the windlass to bring it up until it's just touching the roller, than stepping on the chain. This increased tension draws it up onto the roller and stabilizes it. Once it quits waving around give the windlass button a light touch to get it moving onto the roller. Repeat this until it drops into the trough.

[Stu Jackson]

Wayne,

I think Jeff nailed it when he talked about speed of recovery.  We have the same issue, albeit with our (my) manual Bruce anchor recovery.  When the anchor finally comes out of the water, it can be in one of two positions: right or wrong.  What I do is simply twist the anchor chain that is already on deck just a little bit, let some chain back out and down until the anchor is in the right position, and then haul it up, and it comes in smoothly over the bow roller.  I admit that we don't have a windlass, and still have the tiny toy anchor rollers at our bow, but the issue appears to be the same.  Our ProFurl furling drum is raised a bit off the deck, and there is adequate clearance, but I believe that, even with a lower drum, we wouldn't have much trouble.  Slow and easy should work just fine.

[Wayne]

Its not the speed that makes my anchor 'bump'; it is that the weight of the anchor itself lifts the shank end (teetoter effect) up a bit as the shank has passed over the roller and is starting to move back toward the windlass.  The shank is not yet horizontal , but rather tilted upward (maybe 30 degrees) and the roller furler drum is just low enough to get clunked.

[Stu Jackson]

Ah, I get it now.  This is a pure physical relationship issue (oh no, not another engineer!?!?!)

It would be interesting for other Mk II owners to share their experience of this issue, which, as Wayne says, is NOT a speed thing.

Wayne, what furler do you have?

Only other thing I can think of is to do the last few feet by hand, leaving the chain on the windlass, and engage the windlass after the last few feet of chain are on deck, but, heck, that's not what you bought the whole package for in the first place.

I'm very interested in the answers to this one, because it may be a systemic issue that should be addressed by the factory if it's all stock OEM parts.

[George Bean]

I scraped the side of the furler drum once, but haven't had any trouble in recent years.  I did do a couple of modifications however.  Historically, my biggest problem was getting the chain shackles to feed smoothly over the roller and under the bail.  I have the 35# Delta Fast Set and 40' of 5/16 proof coil chain.  Svendson's rig shop spliced the rope rode directly to the chain (they did swap the rode end-for-end to get unstressed line for the splice.)  I then got one of those "fancy" swivel connectors for the chain to anchor connection.  (There had been some problems with a cheap knock-off swivel, but Svendson's carries the original and better one.)  Last week on the Delta, we swung an awful lot, but the anchor came up O.K.  I temporarily stop hauling in chain with the anchor just below the roller to clean off the weeds (We have quite a problem with Egeria Densa in the Delta this year.)  This might also inadvertently help the anchor to seat properly on the roller.  I am pulling the chain in by hand and the stock still kicks up a bit, but it falls into place without hanging up.

[Wayne]

I'm pretty sure it is a Shafer furler.  The stock anchor from Catalina is a danforth (I think); Farallon puts on a delta for the bay mud.  Probably just remembering to plant my foot on the rode for the last couple of feet is a simple solution.  Of course last weekend I was barefoot . . .