Value of a safety chain

Silvertip

Supreme Mariner
Joined
Sep 22, 2003
Messages
28,771
Periodically we remind folks about the value of a bow safety chain. While many feel that the winch cable or strap is sufficient, perhaps after looking at what stands between a safe trip home and a boat in the back of your tow vehicle take a look at the construction of a typical winch (mine in this example). The first picture shows the single tooth of the winch lock pawl. If you really think that peanut butter quality metal will hold during a sudden stop there are plenty of pictures on the net that you can refer to for verification that it won't. The second picture shows the pawl in the locked position. Breaking the pawl means the cable/strap can free-spool so there is nothing holding the boat on the trailer except for the stern tie downs (if you use them). And just a reminder that the bow of your boat is curved so it will launch right up and over the winch post with no restraint. The lesson here is that an object in motion tends to stay in motion.

WinchPawl1.jpg


WinchPawl2.jpg
 

ezmobee

Supreme Mariner
Joined
Mar 26, 2007
Messages
23,767
Re: Value of a safety chain

Good point. I just had the "tooth" on the winch lock break off on me a couple weeks ago on an old winch I was temporaily using. I had to rig it MacGuyver style to get home using some rope and a pair of vise grips. Fortunately I also have a strap that holds everything down in the front so there was no real danger of losing the boat off the trailer.
 

jay_merrill

Vice Admiral
Joined
Dec 5, 2007
Messages
5,653
Re: Value of a safety chain

Here's how I deal with this issue. Please pardon the lousy photo - its a "blowup" of a photo that I took of my boat on a day that it snowed here in New Orleans.

FrontTieDown.jpg


While it doesn't show very well in the photo, what you are seeing is my bow line running from the eye, down under the trailer tongue, back up to the eye again with a pass through it and then around the tongue one more time. On the upward pass, the line is wrapped around the vertical portion of the line, to the winch post. I keep doing that until the line is short enough to tie off.

This system prevents the bow of the boat from raising up and it prevents the entire boat from moving backwards at all. Safety chains are OK, but most of them that I see are too long. Should the winch fail, they will allow the boat to move backwards by a couple of inches, which is enough for the bow to come out of the rubber V-block. That, in turn, allows the bow of the boat to move laterally. While the chain will probably prevent much travel in this manner, if the movement is violent enough, the probability of the chain breaking is increased. I prefer my system, because the bow of the boat is pulled tightly into the V-block and won't move in any direction easily.

I also run lines port and starboard, from the back of the trailer, to cleats that are located amidships, on the rails. These lines, along with a transverse line across the area just in front of the splashwell, keep the boat from trying to move forward or up.

I don't know that any system is foolproof, but I feel pretty confident that it would take a radical manuever to get my boat to come off of my trailer. In fact, I doubt that it would move much at all. The only drawback to it that I can think of, is the need to replace the lines about once a year. They do experience some rubbing, so the periodic replacement is needed to deal with that issue.
 
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