BoatBanter.com - View Single Post - A new buoy system. This ought to be interesting.

iBoaterer[_2_]

In article , dump-on-
says...

On 1/16/12 5:06 PM, Wayne.B wrote:
On Mon, 16 Jan 2012 13:42:11 -0800 (PST), North Star
wrote:

I have never used a mooring buoy but I assumed they just had an eye on
top and you brought over your own line.
Why is there a line there at all?

In a rough sea, a mooring line is alot easier to pick up with your
boat hook......especially if your boat has a generous freeboard.

===

Yes, exactly right.

When the wind is blowing hard and/or there is a lot of current,
picking up a mooring without a line is very difficult.

When I was a kid and we were at the beach for the summer, we kept our
boats on buoys and mushroom anchors about 200 feet beyond the low tide
sandbars. I usually had so much wax on the mahogany deck of my little
runabout that when I crawled out on it to hook it up to the buoy and
pull over the canvas cover, the cover and I would slide off into Long
Island Sound. Usually the water wasn't rough enough to make attaching a
line to the buoy difficult. Small boats, relatively sheltered waters.

The buoys usually were stainless steel beer barrels. My dad would cut a
hole in each end and thread through a rod and weld the rod to the barrel
and then weld a donut shaped fitting to each end of the rod. We'd paint
the barrels with copper bottom paint.

He welded carbon steel rod to a stainless steel beer barrel? Back in
those days, I take it it was either arc welded or acetylene right?