Whether you are planning an offshore voyage, or spending a day with the family on the lake, it’s essential to have a proper anchor with you. There are a lot of anchors available, each one having a different size shape, holding power, and weight. So it can get quite hard to find the proper anchor for your 17 foot boat.
When choosing an anchor for a 17 foot boat you have to take into consideration the holding power and the shape of the anchor. In general you will want an anchor with a holding power of at least 300 lbs for a 17 foot boat. The shape of the anchor is determined by the bottom in which you will be using it.
So let’s start by looking over the characteristics of an anchor, what they mean and how they affect its performance, and then have a look at some of the best anchors for a 17 foot boat available on the market.
Table of Contents
Holding Power
One of the most important things that you have to take into consideration when you choose an anchor is the holding power. Most anchors are rated by their holding power.
Holding powers refers to the anchor’s power to keep the boat in place while it’s in the water. And it’s measured in lbs.
The tricky thing when choosing an anchor by it’s holding power is that you have to take into consideration not only the weight or length of your boat, but the weather conditions as well.
For example an anchor with a holding power (not weight) of 100 lbs can easily hold a 17 foot boat if there is little to no wind, but if the wind suddenly starts blowing at 30 mph the same anchor won’t be able to do anything to stop the boat. This is why it’s always recommended to choose an anchor that will be able to hold your boat when the wind blows at 30 mph.
A good thing to remember about holding power is that every manufacturer makes different types of anchors, and those anchors can have different holding power, even if they look the same.
So only the manufacturer can tell you the exact holding power of an anchor and for what boat size it can be used.
The Size of the Anchor
The size of the anchor doesn’t influence too many things. For example, the size of the anchor doesn’t influence the weight too much. When it comes to weight the material out of which the anchor is made is more important.
The only factors that are influenced by the size are the handleability and the space occupied.
Most 17 feet boats don’t have an electrical system to lower and pull the anchor, so you will have to do it by hand. So you will probably want an anchor as small as possible.
Overall you should look for a small or medium sized anchor. The size won’t influence the efficiency of the anchor at all, and getting one that is too big will only make things uncomfortable for you.
Shape
Another extremely important characteristic is the shape. Some anchors are designed to be used in waters that have sandy bottoms, others are designed for rocky bottoms, others for mud, etc.
We are interested in rocky bottoms, so let’s take a look at the most common shoes and see which of them are good.
Claw: Very efficient anchor, it was initially used for oil rigs, it’s good for all types of environments, with the exceptions of clay and grassy bottoms.
Spade: One of the best overall anchors, it has a good holding power and has no big disadvantage, the only place where it doesn’t do good are rocky bottoms.
Grapnel: very useful for reef, and rocky bottoms where it can grab onto things, but otherwise not very practical.
Patent: Overall a good anchor butt it doesn’t have as much holding power as the rest. It only performs well in mud and sand.
Plough: Great holding power, but hard to stow. Otherwise it performs great on most types of bottoms.
Admiral: The classic anchor. It has a grat holding power but due to its shape it can be dangerous in shallow waters. Overall it performs well in most types of bottoms.
If you use the wrong type of anchor on the wrong type of bottom, the holding power of the anchor will be greatly reduced, since there is a good chance that you won’t be able to get a good grip.
Weight and Material
Weight and material are somewhat important, but not as important as the rest. So in most cases they can be ignored, what you really should care about is the holding power and the shape.
Does the Boat Type Influence the Anchor I Choose?
Before we move to the recommended anchors I want to quickly cover one last thing.
At this point you might be wondering if the type of boat that you have will influence the anchor you choose.
The answer in most cases is no. 17 feet boats are considered small boats, so there is a limit to how much weight they can carry. So if you have a 17 feet pontoon, or a bass boat, or a skiff, or a ski boat, you shouldn’t worry too much about the weight of your boat. Most anchors that you will find on the market will suit you just fine.
Things get more complicated when we get to bigger boats, if we were talking about a 30 foot boat, or even a 27 foot boat things might be a little different, but right now it’s not the case.
Best Anchors for a 17 Foot Boat
Fortress Marine Anchors – Fortress FX-7
Fortress Marine is one of the best anchor manufacturers on the market, they have extremely well made anchors that are very small and light but with an extremely high holding power. And they are even used by the U.S Navy and U.S Coast Guard.
The fortress FX-7 is a spade type anchor, so it performs very well on most types of bottoms, the only exception being rocky bottoms.
This model weights only 4 lbs and it’s able to hold boats that are up to 27 feet in 30 mph wind conditions.
The holding power of this anchor is 700 lbs, so it will be able to hold a 17 foot boat in the worst weather conditions without any effort.
Two other great benefits of this anchor are the lifetime warranty and the fact that it can be easily assembled and disassembled, so storing it when you are not using it is not a problem.
I’ve personally used this anchor as well as other Fortress Marine anchors for over 10 years, and overall I am quite pleased with them. I’ve never had any problem with them, and they were able to hold all my boats without any problem, whether they were 17 feet or 25 feet.
So if you are looking for a light anchor with a lot of holding power that can be used on most types of bottoms I would suggest you to get the Fortress FX-7.
You can check the price of the Fortress Marine Anchors – Fortress FX-7 on Amazon.
Extreme Max BoatTector Anchor
The Extreme Max BoatTractor is a grapnel anchor, so it will excel in reef and rocky bottoms.
This anchor is on the small side, being only 14 inches long, but despite its small size it weighs 25 pounds, making it quite sturdy.
The fact that it’s small offers a lot of advantages, as we discussed earlier a smaller anchor will be able to get a grip a lot faster than a bigger one, so you won’t have to lower it multiple times. And it can be stored very easily.
This anchor can be used on multiple types of boats like: pontoons, bass boats, runabouts,etc. up to 25 feet, so 17 feet boats should be able to use this anchor without any problem.
This anchor is that it’s not only usable on rocky bottoms, it can also be used in muddy and sandy bottoms, so if you move to an area with a different bottom you won’t have to change your anchor.
You can check the price using this link to Amazon.
Final Thoughts
So finding a good anchor for a 17 foot boat is not that hard, you just have to make sure that you have enough holding power and that you chose the eight type of anchor, depending on the bottoms where you will be using your boat.
In the end I would like to tell you to be extremely careful when you are handling the anchor. While it might seem simple to throw the anchor into the water, that is a bad idea. The anchor can very easily damage your boat if you don’t handle it with care. If you want to know how to properly handle, lower, rise and secure an anchor, I would suggest you to take a look at this article, where you will find a detailed guide with pictures on how to do things correctly: How to Anchor a Boat Step by Step (With Pictures).
Now let’s go over a quick recap of what you should look for at an anchor.
- Holding power: the most important thing, if the anchor doesn’t have enough holding power it won’t be able to hold a boat properly.
- Size: the size is not that important, it mostly affects how easy the anchor is to handle.
- Shape: the shape of the anchor is also very important, some anchors are designed for sandy bottoms, others for rocky bottoms, etc. So make sure that you know what type of bottom you will be using and choose accordingly.
- Wight and material: not very important when choosing the anchor, those aspects are usually taken into consideration when the holding power is tested and calculated.