trailer trouble

waterpirate · May 26, 2016

Are you doing a " float on-float off method? If not some rollers and a winch is prolly in your future. I just put a 10' extension on my trailer to combat bad boat ramps into the back bays. I have keel support and bunks also but " float it on and float it off.
Eric

Tom G P-21 · May 26, 2016

Sailboat data shows two different keels swing and full. Which one do you have? Do you have a photo of the boat on the trailer?

http://sailboatdata.com/viewrecord.asp?class_id=183

rgranger · May 26, 2016

Fred
The link that says "upload file" will let you post pics andother files

You can also cut and paste or drag and drop

Brian S · May 27, 2016

A couple things. You need to have some way to attach the bow to the trailer. Ideally, you'd have a winch, and then a secondary hook on a chain, in case the winch let go as you're going down the road. Not that a sailboat is likely to fall off a bunk trailer, but it could happen. Then, I'm not sure plywood is the best material for bunks. The 90º offset of the plies make it 1/2 as strong as a solid pressure treated 2x6 bunk.

Depending on the ramp angle, you may be able to build side guide boards with a V back to the back of the trailer. These can guide the shoal keel up the center of the trailer (more or less) but they have to be tall enough to engage the keel per the ramp angle and depth of the trailer. Probably easiest to get yourself wet with some swim goggles at the ramp to visualize the actual depth and angles you're dealing with.

I have maybe 4" of height of side guide boards along the rollers my keel sits on. Not deep enough to guide the boat onto the trailer. However, at haulout, there are usually many club members on hand on the docks to guide the boat. (Best technique I've seen yet is a stern dock line paired with a boat pole - dock man can precisely position the stern of the boat by pushing or pulling.) Anyway, I got this brilliant idea to paint the tops of these guide boards. I used fluorescent yellow spray paint the morning of haulout, and hoped the 1/2 hour drive would dry it enough. ;D White paint would have been just as effective. It makes the brown boards stand out from the brown algae covered ramp. Anyway, the guys on the dock said it was excellent and they could see right where they needed to position the boat, and I drove the boat up the ramp more perfectly centered than ever before on the first try. (I had good dock people!)

flynhi4u · May 27, 2016

Fred,
Looking at the sailboat data pic it looks like your boat's keel is partially exposed even when winched up, just like on our Hunter. If that is the case then I agree it can be a chore to get the boat on the trailer properly, especially if your trailer has a tight keel slot you have to hit with the keel, like ours.
I re did our bunk boards on our trailer with new pressure treated 2x4 as that is what it was set up for. I made a long v front the inner boards to the outer boards to help guide the keel into the slot if you are just a bit off when you hit the trailer. This is what our trailer set up looks like.

The technique we have found works the best at our ramps, where we can't walk it in, is for me to back the trailer down and walk out on the trailer with the winch line out to the front of the bunk boards. Cindy drives the boat at a slow speed onto the trailer. She has gotten very good at hitting the keel slot and very seldom requires much correction from me to line her up. Once I can reach the bow eye on the boat I hook the boat with the winch line and winch her on the rest of the way. If it takes us longer than 2 minutes from start to finish it is because someone got in Cindy's way and she had to maneuver around them on her way into the trailer.
Knowing how far to back the trailer down into the water takes some trail and error. I like to just bury our trailer fenders. That still leaves enough of the keel slot for Cindy to sight on and yet enough exposed boards to act as a break and bring the boat to a stop.
The long v leading into the keel slot has really helped, you just want to be careful not to back it too far down into the water and have the v submerged below the keel, if that happens then the v is useless and it is easy to get the keel off to one side and out of the slot. the boat list about 10 degrees when that happens and we really have to back the trailer way down in the lake to get the boat to float up and over the bunk boards to fix that. It only happened once and that was before I added the long V. Don't want it to happen again.
Ramp activities can be one of the most stressful times of boating. Some advance planning and communication can go along way to make it as stress free as possible. If your boat does not have a bow eye on the leading edge of the bow then I bet you did have a heck of a time getting it on board your trailer. I would suggest adding one along with a winch stand and v bumper to the winch stead to pull the bow of the trailer up to. Hook a safety chain to the bow eye once you have the boat in place on the trailer, tie the both corners of the stern down to the trailer and you are good to go.
Good luck and hang in there. You will get it figured out.

Sam

rgranger · May 27, 2016

Oh boy
Iooks like
Boudreaux made dat

You should replace those boards with something a bit wider and then cover with a few layers of exterior grade carpet
And add a winch

flynhi4u · May 28, 2016

I don't mean to put your trailer down Fred but several laws of physics and proven engineering principles were totally ignored by who ever made that trailer.
Looks like the boat is probably sitting on the keel and the boards are just holding the boat level. I had a bad experience with that as our keel had rubbed a hole in the keel trunk causing a leak. Our boat was not designed to sit on the keel and I doubt yours was either.
Our boat now sits on the bunk boards and the keel gets lowered to the keel board so it is not in contact with the keel trunk going down the road. I just crank it back up prior to launch.
Nice whisker pole though. Ours just arrived yesterday. Good thing too, not sure how much longer the boat hook was going to survive LOL

Sam

Tom G P-21 · May 28, 2016

Fred, a couple of things to make trailering easier;
First as already mentioned adding a winch but you also need a bow eye to hook the winch to. I don't see one in the photo's hopefully there is one. Here is a photo of my winch stand which is a similar style boat shoal keel centerboard.

The second is the bunks, most bunks are 2X4's with the boat resting on the wide side to help distribute the load. They should be carpeted or covered with bunk material. In general the bunks are made to keep the boat balanced.Most of the weight is on the keel. Not a great photo but the best I have

I would work on these things first. Another thing would be keel rollers but I don't know if your trailer would accommodate them.

A good source for trailer parts is easternmarine

http://www.easternmarine.com/

Dennis Kitchen · May 30, 2016

flynhi4u said:
I don't mean to put your trailer down Fred but several laws of physics and proven engineering principles were totally ignored by who ever made that trailer.
Looks like the boat is probably sitting on the keel and the boards are just holding the boat level. I had a bad experience with that as our keel had rubbed a hole in the keel trunk causing a leak. Our boat was not designed to sit on the keel and I doubt yours was either.
Our boat now sits on the bunk boards and the keel gets lowered to the keel board so it is not in contact with the keel trunk going down the road. I just crank it back up prior to launch.
Nice whisker pole though. Ours just arrived yesterday. Good thing too, not sure how much longer the boat hook was going to survive LOL

Sam

No! All boats with solid keels should have their weight on the keel, with the bunks just balancing. It's not like a centerboarder.

flynhi4u · May 30, 2016

A swing keel is not a solid keel
At least in the case of our boat, had it been intended to sit on the keel there would have been provisions made in the keel trunk to rest the keel on. There were not and the back edge of the keel rubbed through the boat and created a leak.

Sam

Dennis Kitchen · May 30, 2016

Sam,
A swing keel is a centerboarder: I agree with you that it should not have the weight of the boat resting on the folded swing keel.
I thought the OP said he had a wing keel, a solid keel with winglets. I will go back and re-read.

Dennis Kitchen · May 30, 2016

Sam,
Yep, my mistake. New reading glasses on the horizon.

flynhi4u · May 31, 2016

No problem Dennis. I just knew in our case the trailer was set up wrong and it caused a big old headache in the end.

Sam

Crazy Dave Condon · May 31, 2016

Fred;
I was involved with building of trailers, ordering them to include modifications and so on but learned mostly from a friend of mine now deceased who designed the sailboat trailers for Precision and Road king trailers when I was a dealer. this is right up my alley. Send me an email via the forum with phone number and I will call if you want to go over that. And then we will go from there if you want my help. Even Warren Luhrs and Frank Butler asked me about trailer set up in the past

Tom G P-21 · May 31, 2016

The Hunter is a very different boat from the Dolphin. I did my research before I posted my suggestions. The Dolphin 23 is a shoal keel centerboard. The centerboard is designed to swing up into the keel. The weight of the boat should be on the keel with the side bunks used for side to side stability on the trailer. Here is a link to the original brochure that describes this.
http://dandelionfield.net/dolph4.html

There is also a Olympic Dolphin owners group he should join. There has been a little activity on it recently.

https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/olympicdolphin/info

flynhi4u · May 31, 2016

Good catch Tom,
I did not see that it was a shoal centerboard combo, in that case it should be able to sit on the shoal keel.

Sam