Having gifted my old Moody 36 Joanna with a new Rocna anchor I bought an ideal IFAM padlock on a wire to keep it secure at the berth.

I re-tasked a drop-nose pin having substituted two of the deck plate countersunk machine screws for eye bolts.

I was very happy with the set up.

With anchor movement under way the drop-nose locking pin managed to slip out. Credit: Trevor Martin

Six months later I was motorsailing a choppy west run against wind and wave out of the Solent bound for Weymouth when I heard a rather nasty clunk sound.

Did I hit a lump of floating wood?

Continues below…

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Drifting in a hot air balloon over variable terrain and needing to drop an anchor, you’d surely try to select…

Then it did it again. A really heavy and worrying sound.

Had I caught something around my keel or skeg? CLUNK/BANG.

I surveyed the deck and saw that my anchor was missing!

Simple R-clip keeps the pin in place. Credit: Trevor Martin

I made my way forward and hauled it back on board from its mission to randomly dig chunks of gelcoat out of my starboard hull where it had been swinging with a vengeance.

The drop-nose pin had somehow extracted itself, allowing the anchor to make its way overboard on half a metre of loose chain.

On my return to Weymouth, I realised that I needed to do no more than add an R-clip to the pin. Sorted.

Enjoy reading How to keep your anchor secure when not in use?

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