[sailingdog]

The other thing I don't see being addressed in this conversation so far is an anchor's ability to reset once it had been pulled out. In my experience, the fluke designs, like the Danforth and the Fortress tend to plane and have a very difficult time resetting, especially if the boat is moving at all.

The plough-type anchors seem to have some trouble resetting...and unless the bottom is the right consistency will either skip over it—if it is too hard; or plough through it—if it is too soft.

The claw type anchors seem to like to grab and skip and then grab and skip... but never really seem to reset.

The newer designs, like the Rocna, which I use on my boat, the Manson Supreme, the Buegel and the Spade seem to do much better at resetting themselves.

A lot of this may be more of an issue with a multihull, due to the increased windage and reduced inertia. A monohull takes a bit more time to get any speed on if the anchor drags, but a multihull, which has much less mass and a bit more windage can start moving pretty quickly once the anchor lets go.

One reason I don't particularly like the CQR is the hinged design. The hinge seems to be a possible weak point in the anchor's design. This is also the reason I don't like the Bulwagga anchor much. It has a single strut that connects the three flukes to the rode, and the strut seems to be a likely point of failure. The Bulwagga also has the problem of being difficult to stow and not really bow-roller friendly.

If the next-generation anchor manufacturers are really confident in their product, I think they should offer a 30-day no-questions-asked return policy on their anchors. That is, that if you were to use their product for 30-days, and if it didn't live up to their claims and didn't set faster, hold better than what you had been using, that you could return it for a refund.

In some ways, anchors are kind of like buying software.... you can read about all that the manufacturer claims it will do, and you can read all the reviews about it, but until you actually get to try it out on your system, you can't really ever be sure that it will work as promised with the hardware you have for the purpose you have. Unfortunately, the analogy continues in that most anchors, not being available at chandleries, are difficult to get and difficult to return if they don't perform as claimed.