how to use a mooring buoy....

Toller

Cadet
Joined
Mar 27, 2012
Messages
14
I am mooring a 15' 600 pound sailboat on a medium sized lake in about 12' of water. My current set up is two 20' long heavy chains connected to a swivel, and then two feet of chain through a the buoy on the left of my illustration, to two mooring pennants. Once chain has 150 pounds of steel weights on the end; the other has 50 pounds at 12', 16', and 20'.

I found the buoy on the right at a garage for $5 and grabbed it. (both buoys are 15") The "new" one has a swivel built in, and it seems to me that the weak link in my current setup is the swivel, so if i change buoys I won'd need the swivel. HOWEVER, the instructions for the new one specify that the mooring pennants have to be attached to the bottom, which would take the built in swivel out of the system. I have seen a few of these around the lake, and everyone seems to ignore the instructions. The wire is pretty heavy; I don't see why it should break, but the manufacturer must have their reasons.

So, what do you think of ignoring the the manufacturer's instructions and attaching pennants to the top of the buoy? It really comes down to which is stronger; the buoy or the swivel.

Obviously no one really knows, but sage advice would be appreciated.
 

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GA_Boater

Honorary Moderator Emeritus
Joined
May 24, 2011
Messages
49,038
You want to moor the boat to the anchor chain. The TC3 has the chain through a tube to the top of the bouy , the other has the inner connections to keep the bouy on the chain and isn't as strong as a chain.

The chain through a TC3 can be examined for corrosion, the other can't be looked at and if it's ready to break you won't know except after the the wind blows the boat to parts unknown.
 
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