PART II: DEPLOYING THE ANCHOR BALL AND RETRIEVING THE ANCHOR
Here is a typical anchor ball assembly. It consists of a float, a short line terminating in a shackle and a split end ring made of stainless steel.
To deploy the anchor ball, you disconnect the shackle and spread the split end apart so it slips over the line.
This is a marvelous innovation for: People Who Don’t Always Plan Ahead.
Once the ring is over the rode, you re-attach the shackle.
Then you toss the whole shooting match over the side.
Immediately get underway and head first out at right angles to your rode (briefly) and then head directly towards the anchor. The anchor ball’s resistance through the water will leave it behind you and trail the rode in a big loop. The short length of anchor ball line will keep the rode fairly close to the surface, so you don’t have to sweat running over your own rode, with your propeller.
As you can see in the pic below, the ball will trail out behind the boat. When the anchor ball reaches the anchor, the angle will dunk the ball under water and bring it close to the anchor. The lifting force of the anchor ball (this one has a lifting force of about 60 pounds), plus going the opposite direction from where the anchor laid, will lift the anchor off the bottom. As you continue forward, the chain will slide over that large stainless steel ring and also any shackles. My anchor has a rode to chain splice, so it is even easier to slide. When the ring slides along the anchor shank and reaches the anchor stock, it can travel no further and will now lift the whole terminal end of the anchor assembly to the surface.
When your anchor ball is about as far back from your boat, as the length of your rode (shown here below in the highlighted circle, is about 100 feet back) you can take your engine out of gear. Now you can retrieve the anchor and the entire length of rode by merely pulling it aboard. All you are pulling against is the float’s resistance through the water. You are not vertically lifting the weight of the anchor. The other nice thing is that you can take your time doing this; it’s not going anywhere. In my general experience, Northills and Danforths capture easier than Bruce’s or Claws.
At the end of the "rode"! 
(Sorry! Just couldn't help myself! 
)
Unfortunately, you can’t see the anchor hanging below the line in this pic; but it’s about 4 feet down, hanging on the ring.
Here is the rig (mostly) back aboard. You can see how the ring captured the Simpson-Lawrence Claw after it ran up the shank.
One "gotcha" as pertains to sailors:
You have to either sail pretty fast, motor pretty fast, or have a pretty big anchor ball. This is an 18-inch ball. With a 12-inch ball you have to go between 6 and 12 knots to get it to work (depending on the size/weight of your anchor etc.) I can get the thing to work on a beam reach (4-5 knots for my boat) with an 18-inch anchor ball about 2 times in 3. Otherwise, I have to use the motor. If I was going to use this technique all the time, I would probably go up to a 24-inch anchor ball, which THEN becomes problematic to store aboard. Right now, this whole rig usually sits in a milk crate on top of extra rode stored in the crate for when I’m fishing over deep wrecks.
While my son was in the Army, this really helped out Ole Dad when he was fishing off-shore, since there wasn’t a Strong Young Back handy any more!!
This is clearly not for everyone and if I were not an avid fisherman, I too, would probably find it a little hard to cost-justify the 60 bucks or so. I use this same rig both on my RIB and my sailboat for fishing wrecks off-shore. You get in 110 to 180 feet of water (like by the Tenneco Wrecks) and lifting all that anchor straight up gets Real Old after about the third or fourth time you move to a different fishing spot. The anchor ball takes all the drudgery out of lifting the anchor. One of our fishing/anchoring techniques is not to even bother bringing the anchor back aboard. We bring it in close behind the boat and tow it over the next spot we want to drop anchor and push it out of the lift ring and let ‘er drop!
OTOH, if you have chronic back problems or have difficulties retrieving the anchor to the point where you avoid long sailing weekends, this might be an alternative.
If I ever get to feeling REALLY Froggy on a nice day, I’ll attempt a pictorial technique of Bimini Anchoring and Retrieval, using an anchor ball (and an extra rode)!
Hope this informed, Charles Brennan
An Overdue Promise: Anchoring with an Anchor Ball (Warning: Lotsa Pics) . . . 
-- Charles Brennan, Windrose 18, So. Florida -- 1/1/07 7:03p.m.
Part I: Anchoring . . . . . -- Charles Brennan, Windrose 18, So. Florida -- 1/1/07 7:04p.m.
-- Jeff G. US 21 Bourbonator, Indiana -- 1/2/07 5:25a.m.
-- Doug, P-18.2 Lk Norman, NC -- 1/3/07 10:47a.m.
