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Marine anchors are commonly used to secure a marine vessel to a mooring bed. A vessel may utilize one or more anchors for securing the bow of the vessel, and one or more anchors for securing the stern of the vessel. When a marine anchor is not in use, the anchor must be stowed on the vessel.
Some vessels may be equipped with anchor lockers or lazarettes that are designed specifically for the purpose of stowing an anchor, or that may be adapted to that purpose. Anchor lockers and lazarettes are compartments built beneath the hull of a vessel, and are generally accessible by means of a door or a hatch. Anchor lockers and lazarettes have the disadvantage that they do not provide for convenient access to the anchor. The door or hatch must be opened in order to access the stowed anchor, and the user must reach down into the anchor locker or lazarette to access the anchor and its rode. Another disadvantage of an anchor locker or lazarette is difficulty of use. The anchor and rode must be lifted out from its stowage location below the deck and carried to the position on the vessel where the anchor is to be deployed, typically the bow or the stern of the vessel. A further disadvantage of anchor lockers and lazarettes, which are built into the structure of the vessel, is that the anchor locker or lazarette may have a size limitation or shape factor that restricts the size or style of anchor that may be accommodated by the fixed, built in anchor locker or lazarette.
Anchor stowage devices have been developed as alternatives to anchor lockers and lazarettes, for vessels that do not have anchor lockers or lazarettes and/or to overcome the disadvantages of anchor lockers and lazarettes.
One category of conventional anchor stowage devices, commonly called anchor davits, are designed to project beyond the deck and hull of a vessel and to stow the anchor in a horizontal orientation. These anchor davit devices are typically intended for use at the bow of a vessel. A representative anchor davit design is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,996,524 to Johnson. Johnson discloses an anchor davit comprising an elongated U-shaped frame for receiving a main shank of an anchor; a roller at the outboard end of the frame for guiding the anchor line as the anchor is lowered or raised; a smooth round rod means at the outboard end of the frame for providing chafe protection of an anchor line; and means at a rear portion of the U-shaped frame for securing the frame to a bow, a deck, a gunnel, or another structural member of a boat. Anchor davit devices share the disadvantage that they take up deck space to the extent that the devices are mounted on the deck, and/or they increase the effective length of the vessel to the extent that they extend forward of the bow of the vessel. This disadvantage renders davit-style anchor stowage devices particularly undesirable for stowage of anchors at the stern of the boat, where deck space in the cockpit area is at a premium and where protrusions outboard of the hull and/or deck are inconvenient. A further disadvantage of davit-style anchor devices is the absence of a means for securely holding the shaft of an anchor in a manner that prevents shifting and rattling of the anchor.
Other anchor stowage designs attempt to address the shortcomings of the davit-style anchor devices, especially for use with stern anchors. However, each of these designs possess disadvantages of their own.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,479,452 to Awalt discloses a storage device for a swivel-fluke-type marine anchor comprising a shank-receiving boom and a fluke channeling member both being rotatably mounted to the stern of a vessel, in combination with a back plate fixedly mounted to the stern of the vessel. To capture a swivel-fluke-type marine anchor, the shank-receiving book and fluke channeling member are rotated to extend horizontally outboard from the stern of a vessel. Once captured, the anchor is stowed by rotating the shank-receiving book and fluke channeling member to a vertical stowage position against the back plate. One obvious disadvantage of the invention of Awalt is that it is designed to accommodate one particular anchor design type: a swivel-fluke-type marine anchor. This disadvantage, the lack of compatibility with a variety of marine anchor types, is typical of most conventional marine anchor stowage devices. Another disadvantage of the invention of Awalt is complexity. This design complexity drives complexity of use. To release an anchor, rode is released from a bit arm, a locking pin must be removed from a locking arm. A control force lever arm must be depressed causing the fluke receiving channel to project outwardly away from the vessel, and the frame rotates to its deployed position. The anchor is then in position to be deployed. A similar level of complexity is involved in capturing and stowing the anchor. In addition to driving complexity of installation and use, design complexity drives cost.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,164,194 to Kurz discloses an anchor stowage device that is designed to suspend an anchor above the deck of a vessel. The invention of Kurz comprises a base support affixed to the deck of the vessel and a bracket attached to a railing above the deck. To stow a swivel-fluke-type marine anchor, the stabilizing bar of a swivel-fluke-type anchor is inserted into channels in the base support, the shank of the anchor is then inserted into a channel in the bracket, a locking feature is rotated to close the opening of the channel in the bracket, and a wing nut is tightened onto a threaded stud in order to secure the locking feature such that the anchor cannot come out of the channel. The invention of Kurz is limited to use with a swivel-fluke-type marine anchor. A further disadvantage of the invention of Kurz is that the stowed anchor takes up deck space. An additional advantage is the need to release the wing nut in order to deploy an anchor, and to install and tighten the wing nut in order to stow an anchor. This unfastening/fastening step is inconvenient, particularly where quick deployment of an anchor is desired, and the lose wing nut hardware is subject to being dropped into the vessel or overboard.
As is readily apparent from a review of conventional anchor stowage device designs, what is needed is an anchor stowage device that is simple in design and use and may be rapidly deployed, that minimizes use of valuable deck space, and is capable of accommodating a variety of marine anchor types, including, but not in a limiting sense, fluke-style anchors, claw-style anchors and plow-style anchors.