Why NOT a waist leash?

>> I can however imagine that a waist leash can entangle your leg while doing a side re-entry. Is that correct?

Hmm... nope, I've never had any problems like that.

>> Can waist leashes only be used with a cowboy re-entry and not with a side re-entry?

I always do the bum-first remount which I think is what you mean by a side re-entry... So no, waist works for me.

i agree, no tangles and easy to side remount as your legs are free to kick. on days when i might bail out i use a paddle leash and let the paddle flop around in the water on the high side so i've got a unencumbered hand to grab the handle or side of ski. pete

Hi Where can one buy a waist Leash - cannot seem to find one listed in the online shopping products of the local surf ski / kayak outlets?
Thanks
 

it's going to be a SUP thing first so go down that path.  i'm sure there's a thread on seabreeze with a mention that Balin were developing something 

paddlepop wrote: it's going to be a SUP thing first so go down that path.  i'm sure there's a thread on seabreeze with a mention that Balin were developing something 

Forgot to mention that I am in South Africa...

Hi Where can one buy a waist Leash - cannot seem to find one listed in the online shopping products of the local surf ski / kayak outlets?

I spoke to Dawid Mocke a little while ago and he said he'd found some stock so if you give him a call, he should be able to help you out.

robin.mousley wrote:

Hi Where can one buy a waist Leash - cannot seem to find one listed in the online shopping products of the local surf ski / kayak outlets?

I spoke to Dawid Mocke a little while ago and he said he'd found some stock so if you give him a call, he should be able to help you out.

 

Many thanks 

You could also try www.fitnesslifestyle.com.au/
They sell waist leashes for surfski paddlers.

Does anyone have experience with a waist leash going to the stern of the boat and stuff tucked under the bungees behind the seat? I always have sandals there and on a one-way DW often a dry bag with a change of clothes. I wonder about the leash getting entangled and also about pulling the cargo into the water.

Another question I have is about a PFD attachment. That sounds great from the point of view of not having another belt, but I often have mine pretty loose (I know that's not what I'm supposed to do) and I wonder about the leash pulling the PFD off over my head. Boat gone and PFD gone, that would be bad. (I have the Mocke PFD but I think the problem is the same with others, except maybe if the PFD has a crotch strap.)

you tried swimming in a loose pfd?

I can attest tve is a very good swimmer and safe paddler. I wouldn't worry about him...

I had my own leash failure a couple days ago. The ocean was dead flat so I was surfing 2-3 ft (occasional 4ft) beach break. there were a few people nearby so I stayed leashed as not to have a runaway boat (that was the thought at least). I got some perfect surfing in, waves were great, curled extremely predictably and I was bailing off some near vertical faces as I approached shore (even the surfers were giving me props which never happens around here).

Well, as you would expect after ~20 laps I started to bail a second too late and the wall curled before I could get over the lip. I ended up perfectly parallel to the wave face just as the barrel collapsed on me, rolled me to the ocean side and I prepared to be drug along for a while, but the leash let go at the boat side velcro.

It was getting worn out and I ordered a new leash 2 days earlier, so knew it was dying, but it held up the a similar dump-and-drag situation last week. During that swim it stayed attached and drug me almost all the way to shore from 100+ feet out. I stretched my 10' leash by at least a foot or 2. Im amazed it didnt break.

Looking at Zach and TVE's broken leash, both use a rope-tie to attach the boat end to the coil. This seems like the weak point in the system. The leashes I always use have a swivel on both ends and the boat end is attached with a stainlees steel T that is woven into the webbing. During the dump-and-drag I was pulled so hard one end of the T started to fray through the webbing, but held up.

Basically, im saying I think the rope-to-coil attachemt method is less strong and inferior to the steel-to-webbing on leashes with double swivels. I have only used this style of leash, and is all I will buy going forward after seeing the rope-leash point fail in multiple examples.

The next thing I need to do is make an attachment point at the bow for shore break surfing so that the boat weather-vanes with the bow pointing to the ocean when I eat it (allowing for a fast remount and possibly making it outside the breakzone before the next wave). For open ocean I'll still use the bucket attachment point.


For reference this is a SUP USA brand calf leash. I found an identical one that's cheaper on amazon. Its sold out now, but was only $15 shipped vs ~40 for the SUP USA. www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07YDF1NS8/ref...01_s01?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Those leash fittings look identical to the Mocke leash. I have one and find it very bulky with the fitting sticking straight out. Also you have no way to inspect any of the connections, you can't even tell how they're made. 

I just ordered a leash with belt from metaleash after exchanging a bunch of emails with Salem. It looks promising, I'll report. It's not a $15 item, but if the leash fails at the wrong moment you may not get a second chance...

Re swimming with loose PFD wasnt a big issue once I got my body horizontal. But I could have adjusted it if it had been. I know a loose PFD is not a good habit but I fear it's going to be difficult to change...

I don't really trust either type of leash connection point, I personally saw the swivel type fail with near fatal results in Hawaii a few years back. We were coming in from a run about a half mile from shore when a wave broke on one of the paddlers in our group and snapped the leash at the point were the coil connects to the swivel. I won't go into the details of the rescue, but he was very close to drowning before being rescued. 

I have been using a leash from the stern of the boat attached to my Vaikobi pfd for a few years and would never go back to a leg leash for all the reasons outlined above. Thanks to La Perouse Bay for the initial inspiration!  

I'm wary of the swivel attachment points on regular surf leashes and am fortunate enough to have an industrial sewing machine so came up with my own system. 

Tubular webbing with elastic bungie inside, scrunched up and then tied off to give an elastic stretch but with solid load bearing webbing at full stretch. 

Where the leash feeds through the loop on the pfd there is a large 50mm velcro overlap with a free tab on the end - quick release if required. 

In earlier versions I used the small yachting quick release fittings but find them a little fiddly and have also managed to accidentally undo them with all the mucking around of a remount in reasonable sea. 

To my way of thinking the  weak link is the leg rope attachment point that came standard on my V8 Pro - on other boats I have supplemented with and extra stick on leash point - boat surface properly prepared the 3M VHB double sided tape is incredibly strong. If I didn't have the standard leash attachment point on the stern I'd use two of the stick on ones. 

tve wrote: I just ordered a leash with belt from metaleash after exchanging a bunch of emails with Salem. It looks promising, I'll report. It's not a $15 item, but if the leash fails at the wrong moment you may not get a second chance...

My review of the metaleash ( imetalux.com/ ) is simple: I just ordered a second one for my other boat. The first time out I strapped the belt loosely around my waist below the life jacket and paddled away. That was the last time I thought about the leash or even noticed it until I got back to the dock an hour and a half later and got out of the boat and wondered what was tugging at it . I did some practice remounts last week with a friend and I neither noticed or thought about the leash (I do side-saddle remounts). I no longer understand why the standard surfski leash is the way it is or why someone thought that was a good idea.

I haven't taken a photo of the set-up, but here's an "action shot" from a pole mounted camera. You can barely make out the yellow coil at the very bottom and you can see the orange belt sticking out on my right. I didn't actually notice that it rides this low until I saw the footage, but it doesn't bother me at all.

Metaleash looks very well made. But i still do not trust any quick release hardware. I have had 2 different quick release mechanisms on epic leashes and both would fail (one looks to be the same as the meta leash though hard to tell from the pics on their website). A friend had the mocke quick release, an entirely differently designed piece of hardware, and that too would fail. All behaved the same. All would be good until falling out of the ski. Then when going to remount i would notice with horror that the quick release had disconnected. Unclear if it had happened during paddling or during capsize. I had this happen more than once with each design. Fortunately i tend to grab the ski as i go in. 

I don't mean to squash your enthusiasm for what looks like a very nice leash, but I do feel an obligation to point out safety issues that could get people into trouble. I eventually disabled my quick releases with wraps of epoxy soaked glass on one and multiple layers of heat shrink wire insulation on the other. 

Thanks for the warning, I haven't noticed anything like you say, but best to keep an eye out! The buckle is LB25PC made by YKK ( ykknorthamerica.com/product/lb-pc/ ). When I first got the leash I thought that the coil was too short because it exerts a noticeable pull when stretched to the back of the seat by hand, but I came to realize that I don't feel that pull with the belt and it prevents the coil from flopping to the side into the water. I think that if the buckle releases while paddling that pull will cause the belt to come off and flop into the water, which I would notice. (That doesn't help if the buckle comes undone while falling in.)

I dont have experience with the pmastic buckles. The piece that has failed me is the metal clip. Ill attach a blurry pic from their website

What I find surprising, Mocke came out with a new "pinch" quick release attachment for their leashes a couple of years ago and got feedback from so many customers about concerns of them accidentally releasing, some of their retailers stopped selling them and Mocke recognizing the problem stopped selling it and designed a new leash without it. Thank you Mocke for addressing the problem. Then a couple of months ago I see in Epics catalog that they replaced their already questionable quick release with the old Mocke "pinch" quick release. Maybe someone from Epic can explain their reasoning.

NWS i noticed the same thing in the epic catalog and had the same thought. 

a friend of mine told the mocke brothers in person about the problem with the quick release. At first they doubted him. Then he showed them with a leash in hand how easily the thing came apart. Dawid’s eyes got big and he said “you’re right”. He changed the product immediately after that. 

when I lost a friend to a failed leash Dawid emailed me personally. He had to know if it was one of his leashes that failed (It wasn’t). 

those guys take safety very seriously and are responsive when issues are brought to their attention.