On 29 Oct 2008 14:12:47 GMT, Larry wrote:

I'm more interested in their use to recover from groundings than bridge
passages. To have the self-contained power to lay the boat on its side
to unstick the keel from the pluff mud around here and simply back
yourself off the mud, is worth its weight in gold!


Me too Larry. I'm in a situation where I need to move Valkyrie to
another marina that's a bit shallow for my 6-1/2 ft. draft. It is
soft, silted mud. Experience tells me I can push through as much as 2
ft of it, which is about what I'll be lacking.

However....

I rigged up 3 25-gal "buckets". I figured 20 gal each, so a total of
500 lbs. Hooked 'um up to the spinaker halyard and started hoisting.
WHEW, it gets difficult, then impossible. Ran the halyard to the
manual anchor windless. Lots of tension with creaking and groaning,
then got worried when bucket # 3 was half out the water.

I think my pulley up there must be binding because it was puting a
HECK of a lot of tension on the halyard, then a second or two later
the buckets would move up, then seem to kind of "creep" up an inch or
two. Seems to me 500 lbs shouldn't take that much effort, especially
using a 2-speed anchor windless????

I was in the slip, stuck there in fact since the water was waaaay low.
Shoved the buckets out about 8 ft. from the boat with a spinaker pole
and heeled over about 3 deg according to the inclinometer.

All in all, not a very sucessful experiment.

Rick



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