Beach launching

[Roller]

Hi folks i'm a new poster, I have a bit of a problem. I beach launch and singled handed its near impossible, first section of beach is 5m of soft sand, so pushing the trailer through it is too much for me. I can just about shift my boat [Walkerbay 3.2m genesis with 10hp Honda 4 stroke] through this section if I take the engine off, and take rib off of the trailer

The second section is relatively firm sand, but the trim tabs make a lot of drag, retrieval [uphill as beaches generally are lol] is the hardest part especially with the tide out, its a 30m drag.

My thoughts are, get a ''launching trolley'' i've found a very decent one that folds and will carry 180kg, do you guys think a trolley is the answer to my problem?

My second thoughts were to buy a cheap ''power barrow'' or ''track barrow'' and fit it with a tow ball, one or other will fit in my van and i'm sure will do the job, but the price of either or puts me off, the ''launching trolley'' is £200 whilst the ''power or tracked barrow'' is a darn site more.

I look forward to your reply's

P.S I'd fit bog standard transom wheels but trim tabs are in the way

[MustRib]

welcome to the forum

you can get launching wheels that may fit around your trim tabs.
Trem make some....there are several pictures on here of them fitted to the Honwave range of inflatables...
Just search under Honwave 3.8 and you will no doubt find an image.
good luck

[Roller]

Originally Posted by MustRib

welcome to the forum

you can get launching wheels that may fit around your trim tabs.
Trem make some....there are several pictures on here of them fitted to the Honwave range of inflatables...
Just search under Honwave 3.8 and you will no doubt find an image.
good luck

Hello and thanks, I have seen the Trem wheels, they look a bit flimsy to me

[MustRib]

they worked ok on my Honwave 3.8 with a 20hp Yam on the back
I liked that I could take out the lock pin when floating, and swivel them to the up position
while making way.
I liked that I could haul the boat around single handed, but you have a small Rib I see, as opposed to an airfloor SIB. I dont know comparative boat weights and would take into account the difference in OB as well.
I too looked at a launching trolley arrangement, but in the end the Trem wheels were a lot less hassle, and I could launch pretty much anywhere I could have with a trolley and had the comfort of knowing there was no danger the launching trolley would have been nicked while out on the boat.

[Max...]

TBH the whole rig/beach launch/singlehanded thing just sounds like you are attempting the near-impossible. Presumably you can only launch it in flat calm seas anyway as beach launching even a lightweight SIB in any surf is a PITA for two people let alone one. Maybe best to find a slipway where you can take the vehicle down for a conventional launch? Failing this maybe a winch on your vehicle might help but you will need to be clever to winch it *down* the beach...

I changed my launch wheels the other day for some narrower pneumatic ones that I thought would work better on our local beach and it was a big mistake! It's a steep (quite short) mix of pebbles/sand and my wife and I struggled to pull it down the slope let alone back up, luckily when recovering two big lads helped it back up the slope. I have now reverted back to the big flat/wide solid wheels that roll over anything (look a bit like F1 slicks).

[rocknrolla]

Originally Posted by Roller

Hi folks i'm a new poster, I have a bit of a problem. I beach launch and singled handed its near impossible, first section of beach is 5m of soft sand, so pushing the trailer through it is too much for me. I can just about shift my boat [Walkerbay 3.2m genesis with 10hp Honda 4 stroke] through this section if I take the engine off, and take rib off of the trailer

The second section is relatively firm sand, but the trim tabs make a lot of drag, retrieval [uphill as beaches generally are lol] is the hardest part especially with the tide out, its a 30m drag.

My thoughts are, get a ''launching trolley'' i've found a very decent one that folds and will carry 180kg, do you guys think a trolley is the answer to my problem?

My second thoughts were to buy a cheap ''power barrow'' or ''track barrow'' and fit it with a tow ball, one or other will fit in my van and i'm sure will do the job, but the price of either or puts me off, the ''launching trolley'' is £200 whilst the ''power or tracked barrow'' is a darn site more.

I look forward to your reply's

P.S I'd fit bog standard transom wheels but trim tabs are in the way

get sum 50 /50 box aly ,and a pair of honda big red qaud wheels and make one, get the wheels of ebay,and marine grade aly simples

[SeaSkills]

I had a client on a training course a couple of years ago with a similar problem, and a similar boat. We bought 3 x 2m inflatable tubes and rolled his boat on them over the soft sand into the sea then deflated the tubes and stored them in the boat til he got back. Thy only took a couple of minutes to blow up again, and with a long rope to the car there was no bother at all in bringing her back out again

Worked really well

[m3mm0s rib]

welcome to the rib net forum

[HughN]

I've been periodically struggling with boats up and down a shingle / sand beach (in E Sussex) for forty years now (if you include offering unhelpful advice from a pram).

Ignoring the horrible bits where the boat gets flooded by waves and the need to have a winch, the options I have seen include:

• Inflatable tubes / fenders as rollers - work well, but can result in the hull dropping onto big stones / shingle as it comes off the rollers. A heavy boat can be difficult to stop
• Bits of plastic gas pipe as rollers - don't roll well, so the boat just slides over them, which can't be good.
• Bits of plastic gas pipe cut in half and partially slotted so it bends and follows the keel - not easy to keep in place.
• Railway sleepers and grease - not too dfferennt from the planks and squashed Herrings used by the Vikings. Lots of hard work to put them in place and remove.
• Aluminium trailer with large balloon tyres - very expensive and the tyres make the trailer float, which isn't A Good Thing.
• Twenty mini wheels & tyres on a trailer. Difficult to keep the load distributed and some wheels tended to dig in with others in the air. Rust was problem.
• Four pneumatic trolley wheels on a bogie that replaced the one original single pneumatic wheel (i.e., eight pneumatic wheels in total) - worked well but boat still had to go in backwards.
• DIY 'tracked' trolley - worked well but went rusty very quickly.
• Nothing - Have seen 'members of the travelling community' use a tipper transit on the road and a very long piece of rope to drag a boat up the beach.
• Old conveyor belt as a path - OK, but still needs wheels, etc.,

The I suppose there is this: http://www.rib.net/forum/f8/amphibio...ion-17664.html

The Supacat launcher made for the RNLI is probably perfection.

[Nightfisher]

Hi, Hopefully I was successful in attaching the picture of a work in progress on my inft, it does show the basic front wheel dolly I modified for moving the boat about along with the rear porta-wheels.

[9D280]

Hard sand - either the solid plastic wheels or a suitably inflated pair of inflatables wil lroll over that - it's as good as concrete (unil the wheleel load is enough to sink it!).

Soft sand is a PITA. Inflatsable wheels o nthe rolley at a ridiculousl;y low pressure will disperse the load a bit and stop it sinking. I have seen big dinghies (wayfarers & the like) use double tyres at about 4 psi. Other option could be to ghave twin inflatables, one set relatively firm (for the hard sand) the other at a silly low opressure to give increased surface area in the soft stuff.

I guess there will be an optimal hard / soft ratio to minimise friction on the weet stuff & stop it going under in the soft.

[Boatnomad]

Interesting front wheel dolly unit,any other pictures,thinking of making something like this myself.Even small outboards are heavy SOB's!

[Langton]

Yes, please show some pictures. I have looked all over for a front wheel dolly like that one.

[Peter_C]

Looks like a modified trailer dolly.
Trailer Dolly

[Boatnomad]

Originally Posted by Peter_C

Looks like a modified trailer dolly.
Trailer Dolly

Yes,i would say you are spot on

[Max...]

Originally Posted by HughN

I've been periodically struggling with boats up and down a shingle / sand beach (in E Sussex) for forty years now (if you include offering unhelpful advice from a pram).


The Supacat launcher made for the RNLI is probably perfection.

Hi Hugh, where do you launch in East Sussex? We may well have struggled up many of the same beaches!

Here are some pics of my wheels - if anyone needs to fit launching wheels there are a cinch to make and very simple - a piece of SS channel with a matching piece of SS box - pivot in the middle and a lockpin to secure - a M10 SS bolt with delrin spacers/bushes and some nylock nuts. No welding necessary - just a drill and saw. Super sturdy and easy rolling. You can see the pneumatic wheels I tried which were useless, bigger ones may work better but the w-i-d-e and smooth solid wheels in the pics work very well on every surface; sand (hard and soft), shingle, pebbles etc.

[HughN]

Originally Posted by Max...

Hi Hugh, where do you launch in East Sussex? We may well have struggled up many of the same beaches! .

Pevensey Bay. Shingle is a nightmare - wheels sink in, it gets really steep and it almost always means launching into waves.

Right: NO LAUGHING anyone!! If you might laugh, look away now.

Rubbish pictures, but I once made some 4-wheel bogies that fitted on the axles of the launching trolley in place of the wheels.

Worked OK but the tyres made it float and the handle got in the way of going bow first into the water.

Ended up making this so that it went in bow first and came out bow first.

Worked a treat but rotted away after about 8 years.

I will add these myself to save anyone else the trouble: