I carry two 23 inch TaylorMade fenders which are light and have a hole to tie a rope at each end. This allows me to tie to the cleat with one end and to go around the float with the other end. I have about a 4’ line in one end and 7’ on the other end. I also carry one 16 inch fender for the aft end of the float. This is not always required. TaylorMade site at: http://www.taylormadeproducts.com/catalog/  Every night place a stick at the water level. Due to rain these lakes go and down a lot and you can get stuck.  Aluminum stinger saves ten pounds.  I have loops at wing tips and at Cessna tie down points, critical in high wind mooring.  Seaplanes have a different tie down issue than wheel planes. The tie down tools for wheels are placed under the wing and have the purpose of keeping the wing from lifting, the stake must prevent the airplane from flipping over in high winds. Typical stakes either screw into the ground or have an other methods to distribute the load to prevent being pulled up and out of the ground. Normally wheel plane tie downs have an advantage of being next to a runway and are on hard ground which makes the screw in anchor a good solution. A seaplane is tied along a shoreline where we have sand, gravel or mud. The force on the anchor is from the side. SandSpikes are the only solution which seems to work in this situation. I carry two 19 inch and one 12 inch spike. I carry two lines for the front of the floats to the shore of about 100 feet each and a back line of about 30 feet. SandSpikes available at: http://www.sandspike.com   The front mooring lines are made of a good marine 5/16 or 3/8 poly line. Mine are about 120 feet long. I like them long so I can go to shore and back, makes it easier to leave. I also carry a 30' piece of 7/16 high quality marine nylon rope, gets used for all kinds of mooring situations and flipping the plane around.  Every year we get ourselves into something where we need a come along. Ours is made out two high quality marine blocks and about 120 feet of 3/8 high quality marine nylon line. This gives us a 5 to 1 advantage and an extra length of line if required. |
My Plane N333FF >
