DIY Mooring Installation

Hi,

I am wondering what ideas or techniques people know of regarding DIY installation of a swing or buoy mooring. Any suggestions or insight would be much appreciated?

We did it a couple of times when I was a kid. As far as I remember, the technique went like this;

1- Make up a ply box. Fill with cement and put a bit of bent rebar into it to take the chain.
2- Get heavy ply box up ramps into box trailer.
3- Somehow get heavy ply box of cement into dinghy.
4- Connect chain and mooring line to rebar.
5- Tow dinghy to mooring site. Lift bow of dinghy. Box falls out and chain and mooring line sizzle out.

Optional step 6 - Lift bow of dinghy. Watch dinghy fill with water and head to the bottom of the harbour, near its deepest spot, with the mooring still inside.

6B - see tiny speck far below in the clear water. Watch speck suddenly become much bigger, like the scene in Moby Dick, as the dinghy comes to the surface after the box fell out.

6C - hear and feel dinghy doing a good imitation of a Polaris missile being launched from a submarine, as it comes up under the stern of the yacht at about Mach 1.3.

6D - Decide that this is all too bloody dangerous.

I had mates who made up their own gear for doing moorings, but you're dealing with heavy weights and the consequences of a mistake can be pretty dire. Unless you really want to save money and have a soft bottom in shallow water and a fairly small boat, I'd give it a miss.

If you have a friend with a big cat - do all the things CT said but make the darn thing in a box trailer and put trailer in water at ramp. Tie mooring (when in trailer) to forebeam of cat. Reverse and retrieve wet trailer (take light board off if possible). Or if you have a quiet waterfront, then make the mooring at the waterfront (low tide would be good) and then get the cat over it at mid tide and let the tide pull it up. Lots of bar through the ship chain in the mooring middle when you concrete it up.

Take to place of mooring with all chain and stuff attached. Throw all chain and stuff overboard and get someone in dinghy to lay out a bit. Then untie or better yet cut ties. Ensure dinghy person is well clear.

I did this for my mooring at first. Then a mate had a proper mooring barge to move it again. Now I just pay someone. If I was a long way from a contractor then I would do it - it aint rocket science. Also taking proper video of you renewing mooring pieces may be fine for insurance purposes. In out of the way places this would be better for me than paying someone huge bucks to travel in the slow barge.

cheers

Phil

Not saying to try it but the Romans tried salt water cement.
Do some test of your own. Just don't add any metal.

In an Irish accent taking the piss. Don't take it seriously .

Absolutely!!! Far better and easier to handle a mooring weight made from steel or iron plus it only has a 10% buoyancy factor.
I built these from truck brake drums filled with brake discs and clutch plates.





I transported them to the launch site and a friend unloaded them.

Note there is NO CHAIN. The riser lines were looped as you can see to make it easy for a diver to go down with a knife and new line to replace when needed.





They were placed at the water's edge and I then placed the prebuilt raft over them attaching them with several turns of line to the central beam. The raft was secured in place with two anchors while waiting for the tide to lift the raft.








I suggest that, if you can get any, old railway line would be better and simpler from which to make a mooring weight. Say two pieces in a cross or maybe a square. Have a look around the scrap metal dealers to see what you can find. Lifting weights on a central bar??

Think outside the box and see what you come up with.







Google is your friend. www.google.com/search?q=making+a+mooring+block&oq=building+a+mooring+block&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j0i22i30l3j0i390.26167j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

train wheels are pretty common for moorings

All good ideas above but no-one has mentioned the overwhelming factor of the nature of the seabed. Particularly in mud but also in sand the tidal and current will eventually "bury" the mooring to a greater or lesser extent. The suction effect, particularly as others have mentioned, of flat material, is often a much greater contributor to the holding than the mass of the mooring block. It is for this reason that mooring contractors are most concerned about security of moorings shortly after they have been laid or pulled up for service. Some contractors claim an advantage of diving to service over the more common (around Sydney anyway) pulling up to inspect and service.

So the only issue I can see with using multiple weights is how they are connected, as Cisco's welded up drive sprocket and associated brake drums etc all become one owing to a hopefully good weld job, with a heavy integrated eye for the chain.With a pile of stuff slid down the chain all rests upon the chain connection to the initial weight. I've noticed that when moorings fail if it's not a chafed rope it's because of a deterioration of the thread on a shackle, mouse it & mouse it good. I used a cubic meter concrete mould and worked 10m of stud link into it, with enough chain protruding to reach the surface then a swivel and a more manageable chain, and rope. If you go down this path don't be stingy with the cement, a scabby block will wash away in a couple of years

If your going to use concrete make the base concave so it sucks on a the bottom.