Many one-hole stone anchors have been found around the eastern Mediterranean, in Kaş (Uluburun, Gelidonia), Antalya, Ugarit, Byblos, Kition, the Carmel coast, Caesarea, Ashkelon, Alexandria, etc. They are of varying sizes, weighing from a few to hundreds of kilograms. Apart from the single hole, they have another common attribute – they all fell within a certain range of geometrical proportions, one of which was the length to thickness ratio of about 4.2:1.

The hole in the upper part of such an anchor increases the susceptibility of the anchor to mechanical failure. Sensitivity to three major modes of failure – tension, shear and bending, was analysed. It was found most broken anchors seem to have failed by bending. Such failure could be incurred either during service life on a ship or in secondary use on land.

It was also found that for three-hole composite anchors, the average length to thickness ratio was about 5.5:1, meaning that for a given face area they were relatively thinner and lighter. In addition, they were smaller in face area, and thus had about 25%–50% greater holding power, and posed less handling risk to ship and crew than the one-hole type.

在地中海东部的卡什（乌鲁布伦、盖里多尼亚）、安塔利亚、乌加里特、比布鲁斯、基蒂安、卡梅尔海岸、凯撒利亚、阿什凯隆、亚历山大等地发现了许多单孔石锚。 它们大小不一，重量从几公斤到几百公斤。除了单孔之外，它们还有一个共同属性——它们都在一定的几何比例范围内，其中之一就是长厚比约为4.2:1。

这种锚杆上部的孔增加了锚杆对机械故障的敏感性。分析了对三种主要失效模式——拉伸、剪切和弯曲的敏感性。发现大多数破损的锚似乎因弯曲而失效。这种故障可能发生在船舶的使用寿命期间或在陆地上的二次使用期间。

还发现，对于三孔复合锚固件，平均长厚比约为 5.5:1，这意味着对于给定的面部区域，它们相对更薄更轻。此外，它们的面面积更小，因此与单孔型相比，抓地力提高了约 25%–50%，对船舶和船员的操纵风险更小。