BoatBanter.com - Porta-Bote usage report

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Porta-Bote usage report

Hi All,
Some of you may remember me as I hung around here for some years before
my wife and I left to do a little cruising of our own about 4 months
ago. All is well. After making our way down the California coast and
up into the Sea of Cortez, we’ve returned south to La Paz, about 100
miles up the coast from the tip of Baja where we are having a new jib
made before crossing over to the mainland and continuing south.

Over the years, I’ve given very positive reviews of the Porta-Bote here
based upon our part-time usage of it since we purchased it a little over
3 years ago and I thought I’d just give an update after over 4 months of
continuous usage.

First, the good news: All of the good things I’ve said about this
product in the past remain valid.
-The hull is incredibly rugged. We have run it up onto rocky beaches
and let it rub up against barnacle encrusted rocks with absolutely no
damage beyond a slight roughening of the normally very smooth surface
texture of the hull.
-It rows very easily. I don’t hesitate to row the Porta, whereas I only
rowed the inflatable when the outboard was on the fritz.
-It is much faster with the same small outboard than our 10’ inflatable.
In fact, if I sit in the center seat, our tiny 3.5 hp Nissan will
plane the Porta (I weigh 275 lbs).
-Compared to our inflatable, it’s got a huge amount of room for hauling
groceries, trash, people, etc.
-Beaching it is just a matter of running at full throttle towards shore
and killing the engine just before it gets too shallow for the outboard.
-Setup time is just a handful of minutes, especially with two people
doing it. It takes significantly longer when I do it myself, but with
one of us on each side, it only takes a few minutes. I haven’t actually
timed it, but I think it’s probably faster than putting the floorboards
into the inflatable and pumping it up.
-Unlike inflatables (which are a constant source of problems to a lot of
people down here), it never develops a leak or gets soft.
-It stores very easily on most boats. On our Tayana 37, the 12’ Porta
lies flat on the cabin roof and it is completely out of the way. When
reefing the main, we just step up onto it. It doesn’t hurt it at all.
Most boats stow them on edge along one of the rails.
-They are very stable when stepping down into them (like inflatables),
but you don’t have to step over a wide tube when getting into them at
the dinghy dock. This is a small thing, but when you are old and have
bad knees like I do, you notice these things.
-You stay a lot drier than in our inflatable.

There are also a couple of new good points that have made themselves
known now that we are using it constantly:

-It tows very nicely. At least upwind or at up to about 6 ½ kts
downwind. In fact, it tows so well that while cruising northbound up
the Sea of Cortez, we went for over a month without ever disassembling
it. It wasn’t until a couple of days after we turned around and the wind
and waves picked up while we were underway that we discovered that there
can be a problem towing it downwind. When the speed and waves reached a
certain point, it would start to surf, surging ahead until it buried
it’s nose in the back of the next wave and taking on a bunch of water.
Now, if we’re going downwind, we routinely haul it out of the water and
disassemble it.
-Anytime you leave anything in seawater for an extended time, “stuff”
starts growing on it. The Porta is no exception, but nothing wants to
stick to the polyethylene hull, not even limpets or barnacles. They
just pop right off with a little pressure from a finger. We then rub
the hull down with a little sand to remove the slime and grass that has
started growing.

Now, the bad stuff:
-First and foremost are the plastic seats are failing. First, one of
the plastic straps that hold one of the bails on broke off. This was
inconvenient, but no big deal as it just makes it a little harder to get
the seat in right. But on the middle and aft seats, the bails have
punched through the plastic of the seats and the aft seat is also
starting to buckle on one side. This is bad enough that we are making
new seats out of wood. Now it’s true that I am not a small person, but
even so, there’s no excuse for them to fail so badly so quickly. With
only a 3 ½ hp outboard on it, it’s not like we are really out bashing
into the waves or anything.
-The screws that were used to fasten the aluminum brackets onto the
transom are obviously not stainless steel and are corroding badly.
Eventually, we are going to have to replace them. A minor irritant, but
the manufacturer should never have used a non-stainless fastener in the
first place.
-As we suspected, they are a real pain to get into from the water when
skin-diving (our inflatable is very easy). This is not a major issue.
We brought an inflatable kayak that we intended to tow along if we were
going diving and the intent was that we would use it to get in and out
of the water. In practice though, we haven’t bothered. Instead, we
just run it up to the nearest shore (rocky or otherwise) and get into
and out of the Bote there. This is an option we didn’t have with the
inflatable. If there were no sandy beach nearby, we had to anchor it
and dive from the inflatable.

Overall, we are very pleased with the Porta-Bote and will probably never
go back to an inflatable. We have still yet to inflate our Avon since
we bought the Porta 3 ½ year ago. We do have it with us just in case
the Porta gets stolen or something, but have yet to use it on this trip.

Oh yeah, one last thing. If you are in a populated area such as La Paz
(where we are now) or anywhere else you are using a dinghy dock, expect
strangers to stop you 2 or 3 times a week as you get into or out of your
Porta and spend 5 or 10 minutes asking you questions about it.

Fair winds – Dan Best

There is a porta-bote listserve? Where can I find it and join?

BB,
The Porta-Bote listserver is on yahoo.com

I considered a Porta-Bote and may still depending on how my cruising
plans work out. Right now, a 9.9 Honda Four on a Zodiac RIB 310 is
part tender, mostly "fun" boat on calm night here on Lake Ontario as
it will readily plane. I do use it on occasion for lagoon exploration
or getting to a beach party, but either could be done with the
Porta-Bote, but with a smaller, lighter outboard.

That's the bit that intrigues me, actually. That and the possibility
of adding a basic sail rig, which is what has attracted me to the
Tinker line of tenders.

Question: How responsive do you think the Porta-Bote people would be
to your basic concerns over the short-sighted design decisions
(non-stainless, weak plastic seats)?

Part of the problem with Porta-Bote is credibility, and if they were
beefed up even in a token fashion (optional wood seats, beefier
transom, etc.), they might get a better reception from the serious
(and older) cruising crowd not wanting to haul a 10 HP and a 120 lb.
RIB or 100 lb inflatable in and out of the water all the time...and
let's face it: davits are inappropriate for many boats and have their
own issues, as do some "almost-there" ideas like Dinghy-Tow.

I sure hope Porta-Bote executives are reading this thread.

R.

On Wed, 09 Feb 2005 23:30:38 GMT, wrote:

Thanks for the update Dan. I'm another confirmed Porta-Bote fan, who was very
leery when I went from inflatables to a Portabote. It sounds like you are giving
yours quite a workout!

From my dealings with the factory, it appears to be a very friendly, family
business. I'd be interested to hear what their response would be if you
contacted them about the various minor failures you have encountered. I could be
wrong, but my gut feeling is that they would do something to help make things
right for you. If I was Porta-Bote (which I'm not) I'd send you a set of new
seats if you told me your story - Especially since you've been such a booster of
the product.

I'll also add that they now have a structural plastic transom that can be
retrofitted to your boat very easily. I've been thinking about buying one
myself. They quoted me about $95. for it when I emailed them as to the
possibility of retrofitting it to an older bote.

BB
No connection to Porta-Bote except that I sent them some money and they sent me
a great dinghy.

rhys wrote in
:

Porta-Bote, but with a smaller, lighter outboard.

The 5 hp Nissan 4-stroke outboard drives a 12' Porta-Bote like a rocket. I
think it would go even faster if the outboard had a more appropriate prop
on it for such a sleek boat. It planes with 2 aboard, no problem!

Editor's Note - 2-stroke outboards are MUCH easier to deal with without
having to change oil and fool around with that stuff. Nissan doesn't want
you to lay the 4-stroke outboard in many positions that cause oil backups
inside the engine. Hell, you can lay a 2-stroker in any position,
including upside down and it doesn't hurt it.....

Hi, Dan, and group,

Joining this discussion very late after being on the boat for the entire
duration of the thread, I have this to offer.

I've been assuming I'd buy a PB, mostly as a commuting vessel for when we're
on the hook and working in the high season. Our boat currently has a RIB
and 15HP which barely planes me but not both of us (combined about 375#).

Some of the problems you cite are common, as seen on the several PB mail
lists. I subscribe to many, mostly, originally, to try to find a Bote in my
area to see how they actually worked. Never succeeded at that, but learned
a lot from lurking...

The lists are predominantly the RV and fishing crowd, with a smattering of
international customers thrown in. Sandy, the president of PB, monitors one
of the lists, but I doubt seriously he sees this list, as it's a very minor
segment of his sales.

Most of the discussions are adamant that taking it in rough or open water is
not a good idea at all, and there was a very long-running thread which
started to get hostile about the 14' Bote, before I left. As I've just
returned, I have not seen any resolution on that subject - but that may be
just because I've not read any of my list mail since I returned last night
about this time, being entirely devoted, today, to moving out the majority
of my furniture and a variety of other stuff as we empty our houses in
preparation for moving aboard.

PB offers a 10-year warranty to original purchasers, and will replace any
defective item if you ship it to them for inspection, according to the
lists' chatter and Sandy's comments. I don't know if failure constitues
defect, but if it does, I have no question that they'll replace the
appropriate items.

Since we'll have no use for two of them for the first several months to
perhaps more than a year, we're still expecting to defer our second dinghy
purchase until we return to St. Thomas after cruising for a year or so.
We'd originally expected to use it for our diving activities (snorkeling and
free diving) but anticipated difficulty getting in and out. Your comments
and others have confirmed that - and shoreside works for some instances, but
isn't convenient for many others. Despite that, when it's time for a second
dink, we still expect to make the second one a PB.

Dan, with your permission, I'd like to post your message to the several
lists I'm on, unless you're already on and will do that for the many
PB-specific lists. Sandy does follow, at least, "californiaportaboter" or
similar name, the original list, but there are many other PB lists. He's
known as "porta" on the califirniaportaboter list,
. You can read the archives at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PortaBote/

L8R

Skip (and Lydia, still cleaning after the 14 people here today!)

--
Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig
http://tinyurl.com/384p2

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you
didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail
away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore.
Dream. Discover." - Mark Twain

"Skip Gundlach" skipgundlach sez use my name at earthlink dot
fishcatcher (net) - with apologies for the spamtrap wrote:

Hi, Dan, and group,

Joining this discussion very late after being on the boat for the entire
duration of the thread, I have this to offer.

snip, to moving out the majority
of my furniture and a variety of other stuff as we empty our houses in
preparation for moving aboard.

Glad to know you've gotten that far.

snip
Since we'll have no use for two of them for the first several months to
perhaps more than a year, we're still expecting to defer our second dinghy

We bought our PB second hand (from someone who had two) for $500 and
have had two dinghies almost from the beginning. The inflatable is
good for some things and the PB for other things IMHO, and we have
never been sorry to have two of them.

purchase until we return to St. Thomas after cruising for a year or so.
We'd originally expected to use it for our diving activities (snorkeling and
free diving) but anticipated difficulty getting in and out. Your comments

I have difficulty getting into either dinghy (one inflatable). I have
difficulty getting into the big boat too. PB has a film that they
show at the boat shows that has someone getting in and out from the
water. It may be a more advanced model than ours because ours doesn't
have the flat stern.

and others have confirmed that - and shoreside works for some instances, but
isn't convenient for many others. Despite that, when it's time for a second
dink, we still expect to make the second one a PB.

grandma Rosalie

Skip Gundlach wrote:
Dan, with your permission, I'd like to post your message to the several
lists I'm on, unless you're already on and will do that for the many
PB-specific lists. Sandy does follow, at least, "californiaportaboter" or
similar name, the original list, but there are many other PB lists. He's
known as "porta" on the califirniaportaboter list,
. You can read the archives at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PortaBote/

Hi Skip, good to hear from you again.

Feel free to repost that usage report (I already posted it to the yahoo
list and the Cruising World board). I want to make sure that it is
clear that we are still very happy with the 12' PB as a whole and still
have not dug our 10' Avon out of the bottom of our large aft storage
hold. It's just that it did have a couple of weak points that I felt
should be reported since I've been pretty vocal with my support of the
PB in various places on the net.