Are you tired of your anchor line or a mooring buoy line chafing on the bobstay and whisker stays? Try this. Buy a 1/2 inch s.s. bow shackle and drill out the threaded portion to 1/2 inch diameter. Buy a 1/2 inch s.s. bolt long enough so that there are no threads exposed inside the jaws. You will need a couple s.s. washers and s.s. nylock nut. Option - use a long clevis pin. Attach the jib halyard to a forward cleat and tension hard (this is to support the mast when the bobstay is slackened) Loosen the 1/2 inch bobstay turnbuckle and remove the 1/2 inch clevis pin. Install the 1/2 inch bow shackle outside of the turnbuckle. The jaws of the shackle should span the turnbuckle jaw easily. Install the 1/2 inch s.s. bolt, etc. Tighten up the turnbuckle (a little grease or lanolin couldn't hurt right now), remove the jib halyard and you're there! Anchor or tie up to a buoy as usual and then bring a snubber line (not your anchor/mooring line) thru the bow shackle and back to a cleat. Slack the anchor/mooring line a little and you'll have no chafe or noise! (not recommended for storm conditions!) Jack Harding s/v RAPPORT #298

Another approach is to attach a 1/2" X 6' or 3/8" X 6' nylon snubber line to the tang where the bobstay connects to the bow. The can be accomplished by attaching a large D shackle to the tang below the bobstay turnbuckle such that the shackle's pin is used as a clevis pin. Once the anchor is set, use a rolling hitch to connect the snubber to the anchor rode or chain. After attaching the nylon snubber to the anchor rode, the rode is eased out until the load is taken by the snubber line - Rod Bruckdorfer, s/v African Moon.

This sailing season, we are using a 3/8" X 6' snubber attached to the bollard on African Moon's bowsprit, lead over the port anchor roller and attached to the chain, which runs over the starboard roller. In practice we let our the appropriate lenghth of chain and set the anchor by backing down with the engine. Once set, we lead the snubber line through the port roller, under the bobstay and through the starboard roller. After attaching the snubber line to the chain with a rolling hitch, the anchor chain is eased out until the load is taken by the snubber line. With this arrangement the boat does not sail around the anchor, as it does with the snubber attached to the bobstay tang. Lin and Larry Pardey, s/v Taleisen, go one step farther and lead the snubber line through a snatch block attached to the crance iron at the end of the boat's bowsprint. Because the attachement point is beyond the boat's bow, the boat weather cocks into the wind and does not sail around its anchor - Rod Bruckdorfer, s/v African Moon.