Posted by Andrew Craig-Bennett on March 24, 2007 at 15:06:40 from 195.93.21.42 user ACB.
Following on from the discussion of self draining cockpits, I thought I might point out that Jim Brading's mooring buoy is of the old fashioned type, very seldom seen now, where the buoy floats the end of a coir rope (invariably covered in weed) which is in turn spliced to a length of chain (invariably muddy) which forms the "riser" and is in turn shacked to the ground chain which runs between two anchors, placed up and down tide.
The process of picking up a mooring thus involves bringing the buoy aboard, hauling on the buoy rope, bringing a couple of fathoms of the riser chain aboard and belaying that to the bitts or samson post.
Nowadays boats (almost) all have plastic buoys which are shackled to the riser chain and which have a strop which you pick up and belay aboard. These bring much less mud and weed aboard.
I had a Jim Brading-style mooring at West Mersea in the early 1970s; have not often seen them since.