What do you tie your anchor line to?

[beradon]

I tie to the bow eye so the boat is facing directly into the wind/tide but its not convenient. In fact its a real PITA but where else? What I would like (love) to have is a combination bow light - cleat like Boston Whaler offers as an option. I upgraded to one on a Whaler I use to own and its was a beautiful piece of hardware - Super heavy duty, weighted about 5 pounds and very well made; not cheap but it sure made life easier. Kind of hard to describe but sort of a BITT with lights and made of heavy chrome plated bronze. Its been a while but I remember it being about 1/4" THK and the thru rod about 1/2 x 5 and the cost around 250.00 but worth its weight in gold.

An option that I'm considering is mounting a cleat forward of the hole for the front bow seat. The chair mount base is made of heavy material and drilling and threading for 1/4x20TPI or 5/16 x ? wouldn't be a problem. I don't use the forward casting seat anyway and I have a piece of PVC in the hole that I use it for an add'l rod holder when I'm at anchor.

I've considered mounting a small BITT to the chair plate but I can't find one with a narrow enough base. Improvising something wouldn't be to much of a problem but I certainly don't want a "cobbled" look. The boat is too **** nice looking for anything but first class hardware. Anyone have any suggestions? TIA

[fridaysoff]

Beradon
There are several ways to tie off your anchor line. Most people just tie the anchor line to a cleat on the left or right side of the bow. It may cause your boat to lay a little off to one side or the other but it's a lot safer and easier to tie off that way. You can sometimes correct the offset by turning your motor to one side or the other to act as a rudder to straighten the boat. You can run the anchor line through the bow eye and up to one of the cleats; tie the line off at the left or right cleat. The boat will still lay straight as if you tied off to the bow eye. That way you can leave it like that until you come in and then remove it from the bow eye. No hanging over the bow all day. Good luck!!
John D.

[Jim Jenkins]

Perko makes a bitt for such an application. Does not have the light but looks good and is mounted with four 1/4" bolts and if with a backing plate, would be super strong.

[beradon]

Thanks Gentleman-Both good ideas but neither create a perfect tie off point. Frankly, I don't have a lot of confidence in the strength of fold down cleats and due to the location on a 190 I have a feeling they may be screwed in rather than thru bolted. If they are just screwed in, they could pull out relatively easy and it is my understanding that solid cleats are 5 or 6 times stronger than fold downs.

The BITT option is great but I can't think of a way to install a back up plate. It could be installed on the chair mount plate by simply drilling and threading but because of the base size I would be losing my add'l rod holder which I hate to do and even though its perfectly functional I'm afraid it would take away from the 190s sporty look.

At this point unless someone makes a suggestion which is more appealing, I'll probably mount a cleat directly to the chair base and install chocks on either of the bow light. I can't use B/U plates on them but If i run the anchor line thru the bow eye (as suggested) there isn't a great deal of strength required since the pull is distributed equally between the eye and the cleat (I think)

I'm sure many others have wished for a more convenient tie off point maybe someone came up with one of those head slapping (why didn't i think of that)ideas. Hopefully they'll chime in. Thanks for the suggestions!

[Putershark]

How deep of water? (dumb question right?) reason I ask is I use my Power Pole to stake me off and the Cajun Anchor system I have seen (look in the Flats section) would also work for your shallow water work.

As for my anchor, it sets in my port side front hatch 99.9 % of the time and if needed, I just tie it to a cleat. Now if you have a trolling motor installed and not in 5 foot seas, once could always tie the anchor rode (line) to it as it is laying down in the stowed position, and it should hold to boat with no real issues I would think...

[beradon]

Hi Putershark!

I'm out on the boat fishing several days a week but weekends are for the family (wife,me & the dog) and we usually spend em anchored just off the beach at Picnic Island, near St James City, Pine Island. Its a nice place to hang out, have a few drinks, barbecue on the beach let the dog run etc but it gets rough and on most days there's an actual surf and its absolutely necessary to have the bow facing into it. Its sandy and we back in until the bottom of the boat at the stern is actually on the sand and anchoring is the only way. I use a line with a lot of stretch to minimize the hard shocks. Since we usually stay there 5 or 6 hours I end up adjusting the line a couple of times to compensate for the tide changes.

And I fish Pine Island Sound from north to south and it also gets rough and I use the anchor a lot. I think my best (only) option is to mount a cleat on the seat base and tie off to that. On the days that its particularly rough I'll make 2 loops thru the bow eye first. On still days or at slack tide, I'll just make 1 loop or tie off directly to the cleat. I think its worth a try and if for some unforeseen reason it doesn't work, just a matter of filling a couple of holes with set screws. I'll give it a try and report back, if it works I'll take some pictures. Thanks for the suggestions!

[Putershark]

I would like to see that and good deal Brother, for we never seem to have enough mods pictures in the 190 picture album that is just for those kinds of upgrades

[ILLOGICAL GGC]

there is a pic in my album that shows my trolling motor install and the cleat i put between the front storage boxes on my 01 186

the image shows the cleat i put on front of my 186 and it did a good job . was able to thru bolt at the position it was mounted
i have forgot how to transfer the pic to here so you will need to go look for it

[MolarBoater]

If I am out in the gulf, I use a large stainless carabiner/spring hook on the bow eye, then run the line thru it to have the anchor line "virtually" tied off at the bow eye while using a cleat. I only do this if it is rough as I usually will just tie off to the cleat by itself.

[tfink]

I have a 195 DC and had a similar problem. I have a cleat on the bow pulpit (came with boat), but I added another one inside the anchor locker. By doing this I don't worry about losing the rope and anchor overboard. I still tie off with the cleat on the bow pulpit, simply because I assume that it would be stronger than the one I added.