Crab & Lobster Floats - Here's an idea...

[LCBrandt]

When we were bringing High Flight back to the Columbia River a week ago, we wanted to enter Gray's Harbor to see what it was like. Hadn't been in to Westport before by boat, so we were just checking it out. Well, during the last 5 or so miles approaching the Gray's Harbor Bar, we entered a 'field' of crab pots. It was thick with them, like a mine field. It was late in the day so if we had snagged one we would have been wrestling with it in the dark. The seas (wind waves) were 3 to 4, making it very difficult to spot the rascals with enough time to do anything about them.

So here's my idea.

Needing to haul my boat in the next month, I thought about installing a cable attached to the bottom of the keel that 'stretched' back to the bottom of the rudder. A bolt set into the lead keel, and another into the fiberglass rudder bottom end, would provide an attachments that a thimble could fit over. Selecting the right spot on the bottom of the rudder would allow the rudder to pivot with steering and not place any load on the cable and rudder. The thought is that a crab pot line would slide down the cable, keeping it away from the prop and the upper leading edge corner of the rudder.

Does this make sense to anyone? Any other ideas?

[Nimue]

It certainly is possible. I would suggest that you will find there is a ton of flex in the boat, and that you need a good inch or four of slack in the cable to accomodate this (both fore-aft bending and side to side flex). Fortunately there is no reason the cable needs to be tight to do it's job. It will probably 'sing' at certain speeds and it will definitely have some impact on speed, but if you are not racing it is probably not enough to worry over.

[dwarburton]

I have heard it done before, but I would think that the cable would catch a lot of seaweed etc.

In my experience with lobster pots, and occasionally my own mooring, I have found that the float will usually clear itself eventually unless it gets caught in the gap between the rudder and hull. If it does, then you are stuck. When the boat is out of the water, make sure the triangle of material in front of the rudder is big enough and fits closely enough help a line work its way down the rudder and to prevent a line from wedging in.

If you do a lot of motoring through the pots, a line cutter on the propeller is also helpful, although throwing it in neutral when you hear the first clunk can also save you most of the time, since it does take a few seconds for the line to unsnag itself from the keel.

Dave

[deising]

While it sounds like the idea may work, I wonder how many pot lines are snagged from the 'side' of the propeller as the float works its way aft along the waterline. The cable under the keel/rudder may not help at all then.

I have only had one wrapped pot line and I was glad it was in warm, relatively calm water. I still needed my SCUBA tank and hose to free it up. I always carry the tank and hose on the boat. Anyone who has done this knows how easy it is to have the boat crush your skull in wave action.

[Steve Frost]

Larry,

Lobsters are tasty but, I am happy they are not fished im my home waters.

Several years ago we took a vacation in Duanes stomping ground in the Florida Keys. We stayed on Duck Key, we rented a skiff to go to a dive spot, Sombraro Reef south east of Duck Key. It took about an hour to get there in a Boston Whaler with a sixty horse outboard. I do not see how you could have sailed it as it was opening of lobster season and the trap floats were spaced about fiftey feet apart the entire distance there, insane.

Outside San Francisco Bay we see an occasional crab trap but nothing like the curtain of lobster lines we saw in the Keys.

[plaineolde]

I've seen this done in the Chesapeake, though not on a C36 specifically. My question is; how to you get hauled/launched since the sling would either be trapped inside the cable (launch) or the cable would be trapped by the sling (haulout). You could obviously attach the cable with a snap hook of some sort, but since I launch early/haul late, the water is VERY cold, and I'd not like to have to go in after it.

I'd love to find a solution, getting a crab pot float jammed between the prop and hull is a real pain, especially when the water is too cold to take a plunge.

[LCBrandt]

Gary, your comment about the sling was exactly the kind of 'gotcha' response I was hoping for. Thank you! Here I thought I had this all figured out, but there would have been no way to splash the boat. Well, back to square one.

[Steve Frost]

Well if we are accepting hair brain ideas, why not just a straight rod extending from the bottom of the keel past the prop and rudder to deflect the line past the prop. The hoist sling could be walked in above it.

Or better yet, razor blades on the leading edge of the keel to just cut the lines as you go through them.

[Nimue]

ACtually it wouldn't be that hard to build a race-boat style 'kelp cutter' into the front edge of the keel, and bring the rod up along the head wall somewhere. However my experience of those has been that they don't do well living in the water all the time and they are not usually up to the task of cutting a trap line, or at least not doing it quickly.

[stu jackson c34]

Good concept, Larry, just figuring out that the devil's in the details.

Why not pm Maine Sail - I'll bet he's got a solution.

Steve, going from SF down to Half Moon Bay and south to Santa Cruz at the 100 to 120 foot depth line, just inside of the southbound shipping channel about a mile or two miles off the coast is the nastiest line of crab traps I've ever seen. I talked to Jeff Berman, a C36 skipper here, who said it's OK to SAIL over them, but to NOT motor. He's had more experience out there than I have, although I must say I've been out quite a lot.

Doz guyz up in Maine, I'll tellya, dey must know how...:)

[John Reimann]

Why not just wait to sail until after dark? As everybody knows, they take in the crab pots at night, which is why nobody I know has ever snagged one at night time.

[LCBrandt]

Even sailing over them can get you captured. Last year, in the Oregon Offshore Race (Astoria to Victoria, each May), a Catalina 36 got snagged by one.

I suppose it's a topic of another thread to discuss the procedure of getting away from one that trapped you. Here in the Pacific NW, most probably: (1) You'll be stern to the waves and swells; (2) the boat motion will be violent; (3) the water temp will be 50 degrees; (4) you'll be on a lee shore; (5) Murphy's law says that it will be night; (6) you'll be beyond VHF range to the Coast Guard; and (7) even if successfully cleared, the delay will mean you'll miss your bar crossing window and you'll have to wait another 12 hours to cross the Columbia River bar. Damn.

Up here, John, the crab traps stay out 24/7. The crabbers only go out to retrieve, harvest, and immediately re-bait and drop.

[LCBrandt]

My crew just called me with two ideas.

He says the sling worries with a cable aren't a big deal: Would you rather dive the boat at the yard? Or have to dive the boat offshore when a trap has caught you? "Easy choice for me," he says.

Another racer told him part of the answer was a Flex-Fold prop. This other sailor believes the lines would just slide off the FlexFold - presuming you're sailing, I would guess; under power would be a different situation.

[deising]

I was going to say... John, where are you that they take the pots in at night? Never heard of that anywhere.

[John Reimann]

I was going to say... John, where are you that they take the pots in at night? Never heard of that anywhere.

It's an old joke down here. Sorry about that.

[deising]

No need to be sorry. It is funny in retrospect.

Reminds me of my primary flight training doing dead stick night landing simulations over unknown terrain. The instructor said to turn on the landing light about 200 feet AGL (above ground level). If you don't like what you see, turn it back off.

Cheers!

[Steve Frost]

I had heard this is the same mindset used by the Whitbred around the world race. The racers in the southern ocean convinced themselves that ice bergs went away at night so the would not need to worry about not seeing them.

[TomSoko]

Larry and Dave,
Getting a pot line trapped between the rudder and the hull happened to me a few boats ago, so ever since then I have installed a "deflector rod" on each of my boats. There is a picture of one in the Upgrades section of the website. Actually it's in a link to my Julandra upgrades. A 1/4" bolt screwed into the mini skeg just in front of the rudder, angled back 30-40 degrees, then cut the head off. It won't keep you from wrapping lines in your prop, and it won't keep you from snagging lines on the rudder, but at least the line won't get wedged between the rudder and hull, and can be pushed down and off the rudder with a boat hook.

[LCBrandt]

Nice photos on your website, Tom. Found the deflector, and I am wondering what your reasoning was in deciding how far in front of the rudder leading edge to position it?

[caprice 1050]

Tom
How do I get into your site for Juliandra Upgrades.?

[LCBrandt]

Mike, first find Tom's article on Julandra Upgrades in the Technical - Upgrades library of our website; there's a link there.

[TomSoko]

Larry,
Nothing super scientific about the placement. I simply copied what I saw on another boat. By turning the rudder off to one side, I was able to drill a hole in the "skeg", and screw in the bolt at an angle. I wanted it fairly close to the rudder, so that it would actually deflect any pot warps.