Like ‘Em Hard or Soft?

[Rob2435]

Trying to decide on a dinghy, hard or soft bottom is a difficult choice. They both have their pluses and minuses. Hard bottoms, no boards to pull, no leaking bottoms due to tearing the bottom on an unseen rock near the beach, tend to develop air leaks between fiberglass bottom and tubes… Storage is easier in the water, you can paint the bottom but harder to store in the winter.

Soft bottoms/air floors have their issues as well. They fold up but how often do you fold up the dinghy and store it on the boat. The bottom has a leak from hitting the beach a bit hard. Bottom boards are a pain, inflatable floors might be better…

Have been going back on forth and can’t make a decision on which is the best for our use. No dinghy dock at our marina, mostly salt or brackish water use, northern latitude. Storing the dink during the off-season is an issue, fold the soft bottom and store in/on boat or store the hard bottom on the deck. How do you decide???

 

[Stu Jackson]

Good list of + & -s.

If you put aside the eventual storage issue, the big question you maybe haven't explained is how do you plan to use the boat?

Hard bottoms are usually bigger.

 

[McIntoshUSA]

Hard Bottoms, you can add more bouncy if you ever need it down the road. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJqPqRnxQeQ Of course this will also add weight.

 

[centerline]

hard bottom as in a RIB (rigid hulled inflatable), or a soft bottom with a removable hard floor???
and then there are the inflatable soft floors...

hard bottoms (rigid) are a lot heavier, but otherwise better for everything except when you need to roll the boat up for storage.

soft bottoms will be more forgiving in a river raft where rocks may contact it, and it can be rolled up and stored very easy and quickly..... a removable hard floor can allow for better functionality when using it, but there is a much longer and a bit more difficult set up and take down time....

for a boat the size of your "mother ship", I would look strongly at the inflatable floor model as it offers a good compromise between all that you will probably want... and most of the inflatable floors now are self bailing, so they are easy to wash out.

at this stage of my sailing life, I prefer a hard dinghy, but if I ever have to move to an inflatable, it will have the inflatable soft floor.

 

[Stu Jackson]

..... a removable hard floor can allow for better functionality when using it, but there is a much longer and a bit more difficult set up and take down time....

I once had one of those.

YUCK!

Worse than 5200 Satan's Glue!

Never again.

 

[centerline]

I once had one of those.

YUCK!

Worse than 5200 Satan's Glue!

Never again.

the removable floors, I agree, but some people love them...
they have their place and serve the function well for divers that will also use the dinghy for accessing dive sites, but still need to roll the boat up for storage. anyone who has tried to dive out of an inflatable with a soft floor knows. and the inflatable floors that are taking abuse from dive equipment will not be in great shape for very long.

so, as you already asked, what purpose will the boat be used for?

 

[Benny17441]

You have to make your own decision, think about the following things;

Stability, weight carrying capacity, rowing or outboard, what kind of use do you anticipate, how big is the mother ship, folding, towing or davits, durability, storage and upkeep.

 

[BigEasy]

Purchased a West Marine compact RIB with a hard bottom & folding transom last spring. It was on sale for about $1600 including free shipment to store & got about $75 of West Advantage "points". Weight is about 95 lbs. Has a nice storage bag but not suitable for storing outdoors. I installed a type of car top carrier hoist in the ceiling of my garage and hoist up to the ceiling to store. Overall I was satisfied with the purchase. I don't use it too often; therefore, I just tow it behind the boat. I plan to rig a bridle so that I can use the spinnaker halyard and drum on my windlass to hoist it onto the foredeck if I need to.

 

[Stu Jackson]

http://www.westmarine.com/WestAdvisor/Choosing-An-Inflatable-Dinghy

 

[Bad Obsession]

I am just old fashioned in some ways I guess. I am still towing around a fiberglass dingy. I bought it used for $200. It works great, tows great, rows great, and I have a small motor for it when I want it. It isn't as stable as an inflatable boat but it is darn near bullet proof. It weights a little less than 100 pounds, I guess, but it has floatation built into it.

I has hundreds of miles on it behind my boat...Probably well over a thousand actually (or more). There are tricks and tactics to towing a dingy and it does slow you down in some conditions, but it is worth it to me. With a 23 foot boat I don't have the storage for an inflatable dingy and when I had my 30 I could have put it on the foredeck but I never did.

I bet it will outlast any inflatable dingy in the end!

 

[BigEasy]

I like that philosophy; keep it simple and practical!

 

[Bob 04 H260]

We have had 3 inflatables with air decks. They work pretty well. They can however collect a lot of water under the inflated floor. With an inflatable keel it is a big volume that you can't bail out. Even with davits I could not get it all out. I had to motor to a beach, take motor off, empty the boat and invert it. Not a lot of fun. Any of the inflatables need a bigger motor than RIB or hard dinghy. The coral beach can eat them.

We started off with a regular fibreglass dingy. Trying to stand up in one to lift a dog up over your head to put them on a seawall does not work. You go for a swim. It only lasted one season.

Our 5th dinghy is a RIB. It is a 9' AB aluminum, ultralight. It only weighs about 70 lbs. It goes quite well with a 6 hp motor. It will be harder to store away in the off season. Everything is a compromise !

Bob

 

[higgs]

You gotta examine your use. I have a soft bottom with battens for floor boards which can be left in when I roll it up and store it on deck. I sail in an area where we get rough seas so towing can be a problem. You go hard bottom you will either need davits or be able to tow.

 

[bletso]

We are trying a Porta-Bote. Not real hard and not real soft. People seem to like them. I have had an inflatable and its a pain to store and I had a fiberglass, which was nicely built but really heavy for it's size. Now if someone just built a dink for all seasons....

 

[Kestle]

We are trying a Porta-Bote. Not real hard and not real soft. People seem to like them. I have had an inflatable and its a pain to store and I had a fiberglass, which was nicely built but really heavy for it's size. Now if someone just built a dink for all seasons....

How well has it handled short, steep chop under motor?

Jeff

 

[Tim R.]

We had a Mercury 10' fG RIB and went to an Avon Rover inflatable floor for about 3 days. We are now back to a RIB. Once you go RIB it is hard to use anything else. Especially if you have a medium sized dog. We use a Highfild untrlight 290 aluminum floor RIB that weighs about 80 lbs. We have towed it thousands of miles and even across the gulstream. We can also store it on deck. It tows so well and has very little effect on boat speed. Not cheap but comes with a 10 year warrantee.

 

[Gunni]

I am on season 13 with a folding-transom RIB like Big Easy's. Zodiac, Avon, Walker Bay all make a version. The WM is built by Zodiac. I have davits, but on passage aboard a delivery we have have folded the 90lb boat into it's carry bag, carried aboard and tied it on the foredeck, where it travels well. My dink is the boat pick-up truck and as such it gets beat about, beached, and has to serve in rough water. Only a RIB would work. I mount a 9.9 4-stroke that weigh's almost as much as the boat, and regularly haul 4 people, or sling a kedge anchor in when we ground.

 

[BigEasy]

Gunni,
Glad to hear that your folding transom RIB is holding up well. I had some concerns about purchasing mine; I thought that the interface of the folding transom where it attaches to the fiberglass bottom and the adjacent tubes might be prone to fatigue and leaking. If yours has held up for 13 years, that is good news!

 

[thinwater]

The secret of happiness is well designed davits. If I had to tow or roll, I would stick with kayaks. Therefore an inflatable or roll-up floor has no value to me.

That said, I've had a Hypalon rigid floor inflatable for 10 years and find it to work very well.
* Lighter than RIB, which means smaller people have an easier time launching.
* If the floor is rigid (not roll-up, with aluminum rails to hold the floor fully rigid) the footing is very good and it takes internal abuse just fine.
* Will plane with 6hp with one person aboard. Neither inflatable floor nor RIB will do that.

Yes, you need to be mindfull on the beach, but remember that the floor is NOT inflated and any tears easy to fix (a small tube down the middle, inside the outer cover gives shape and is VERY hard to puncture). But I've never had a tear.

Yes, they are a little tougher to store on davits when the air leaks, but tricing lines suffice to give good support. And there is less weight.

I will replace it in a few years with the same type.

 

[Gunni]

Gunni, Glad to hear that your folding transom RIB is holding up well. I had some concerns about purchasing mine; I thought that the interface of the folding transom where it attaches to the fiberglass bottom and the adjacent tubes might be prone to fatigue and leaking. If yours has held up for 13 years, that is good news!

Keep up with the plywood transom. My aft-season maintenance routine is to keep the transom painted. The tubes are PVC decitex fabric - I scrub the boat to remove debris, then aggressively wipe down the tubes with acetone (rubber glove PPE), slather on 2-3 coats of 303 UV protectant, let it dry and bag it. I will give it another coat of 303 mid summer. 13 years and I'm still awaiting the much hyped PVC plasticizer failure apocalypse! The great thing about the PVC decitex tubes is that you can patch them quickly, down'n'dirty and be underway in minutes - but you have to get that 303 off (acetone or MEK).