Although I have been involved with a wide variety of boats and marine
activities, racing has been about as far off my radar screen as polo
since shortly after High School (Co-captain of varsity sailing team).

Your towing method makes perfect sense. If the dinghy is close enough
for the painter to take some weight, you are lightening it very
effectively. The downside is steeper flow lines and shorter waterline
but being in the wake of the larger vessel would easily offset that.

Didn't you have trouble with it banging into the transom?

I tow Maine traditional cruising style. I let the dinghy out to just
past the crest of the first stern wave so it's being pulled up the
wave. It rides there rock solid and the wave keeps it from surging
forward if the boat slows down. There's probably a little more drag
that way but we're already where we were going most of the time.

You just have to remember to pull the dinghy up short before going in
reverse with the engine. One of my projects next year is to find a
tow line that floats without being unpleasant to handle.

--

Roger Long

On Sun, 08 Jan 2006 12:16:03 GMT, "Roger Long"
wrote:

Didn't you have trouble with it banging into the transom?

=============================

Sure. We actually chafed a hole in the nose of one inflatable. What
a weird noise that made. The trick is to get the distance just right
for conditions, AND keep an eye on it.

By no means the nicest looking boat around but I thought they made a lot of
sense. Considering the amount of use most dingy's/tenders get, I don't want
to spend a small fortune and I want something I can tuck away somewhere
until I need it. I'm happy to hear you like yours as I am considering one
myself.

"Martin-Paul Broennimann" wrote in message
...
Try the folding boats. real interesting.

http://www.porta-bote.com/

--
Martin-Paul Broennimann
architecte et urbaniste SIA/FSU

14, rue du Diorama
CH 1204 Genève Switzerland
0041 78 627 29 67

arrêt TPG place du Cirque
parking Hôtel des Finances

visit our website= www.broennimann.com

"Thomas Wentworth" a écrit dans le message de news:
7YSvf.510$ID1.371@trndny01...
Just looked at a 32' old full keel boat. I really liked the boat, it
needs work but it is the usual paint, etc.

Then I got to thinking ???? Where would I put my dingy when I go off
cruising. I would think that it would be in the way on deck.

Any thoughts? Do the rubber ones deflate and inflate easily?

On Sat, 07 Jan 2006 23:03:08 -0500, Wayne.B
wrote:

On Sun, 08 Jan 2006 02:39:49 GMT, "Roger Long"
wrote:

I would have an inflatable myself if there wasn't a way to carry it on
deck for times like that or when the psychological effect of 1/8 knot
on a long beat feels burdensome out of proportion to the actual time
lost.

When racing a sailboat, 1/8th of a knot feels like a 100 mph speed
difference. We used to participate in a lot of race/cruise events
where we needed the dinghy at night. If we couldn't get someone not
racing to tow it for us, we would deflate it and roll it up every
morning. That's a major pain of course but there was no way to race
competetively while towing.

I raced in a week-long point to point regatta this summer that
included multiple nights at anchor. They allowed a handicap adjustment
of around 15 s/mile for towing a dinghy. We rolled and stowed ours
while our closest competitor towed. I'd like to argue that the
adjustment was too big, but it wasn't far off. Tight finishes just
about all week in good wind. As you say:

1/10th of a knot in boat speed equates to
about 12 seconds per mile and most serious racers would kill for a 3
seconds per mile advantage,

I wouldn't bother deflating the dinghy for cruising speed.

Ryk

Commodore Joe Redcloud wrote in
:

I'll second that.

Me, too! The 5HP Nissan 4-stroke outboard PLANES Lionheart's 12' Port-a-
Bote with 2 aboard...(c; VERY DRY IN MODERATE CHOP, too! You don't HAVE
to arrive ashore lookin like a drowned rat.

I'll add another vote for the Porta-Bote. We've been using our 12'
non-stop for the last 15 months as we cruise Mexico & Central America's
west coast. While it's far from perfect, I can't see us ever going back
to an inflatable.

Good things:

Rugged. Drag it up on sharp rocks or let it rub against barnacles, and
you wind up with some cosmetic scratches, but nothing that affects it's
performance or lifetime.

Dry. Because you're sitting inside the boat and not on the tubes with
your rear hanging perilously close to the waves, we stay MUCH drier than
we ever did in our 10' inflatable.

Faster. About twice as fast as out soft floor inflatable with the same
outboard. We use a 6hp 4-stroke Mercury (right at the upper recommended
weight limit for the 12') and it flies at almost 12 kts with my 260 lbs
aboard. Somewhat slower with both of us aboard.

Lots of room for groceries. Since much of the volume is not taken up by
inflatable tubes, there's lots more room for groceries, trash, jerry
jugs or people.

The 12' stows flat on the cabin top or our Tayana 37, adding no real
windage and when reefing the main or something, it's tough enough that I
just step up on it.

You never wake up and have to pump up the dinghy.

Bad things:

The plastic seats don't stand up to the tropical sun. After about a
year, we (and everybody else we've met with them down here) have had to
have wooden ones made.

Others (but not us) have had a problem with the black tube that runs
along the keel pulling away from the boat.

The oars that come with it also don't stand up to the tropical/salt
water environment. The fittings rust and the plastic parts become
brittle and break.

Some of the fittings on our wooden transom are not stainless steel (they
now make a plastic transom that I have never seen and would worry if
it's made out of the same stuff our seats were made from).

We will probably have to make a new transom for it eventually.

Not as much reserve bouancy in the stern. This translates to being a
bit more subject to being pooped when landing though the surf (a 12'
dinghy full of water being pounded by the surf while everything in it
washes out does not make for a fun afternoon - trust me on this one).

While we never have to pump up soft tubes, we do have to bail it out.
In a few of the torrential rains down here during the rainy season, it
threatened to swamp itself. On the other hand, when hurricane Adrian
threatened us in El Salvador, we pulled the engine off and intentionally
filled it with water to stabilize it and it was just fine.

The safety floatation plastic foam doesn't stand up to the tropical sun.
It sheds stuff when it gets rubbed.

Bottom line.

I get the impression that it was designed for higher latitude use by
hunters and fishermen, but even with it's weak points, it makes an
overall better dinghy for us than inflatables.

For what it's worth, we've run into several people using Porta-Botes as
dinghies and none are contemplating going back to an inflatable. On the
other hand, there are a few inflatable owners that are considering
switching to Portas when they get back to the states.


Larry wrote:
Me, too! The 5HP Nissan 4-stroke outboard PLANES Lionheart's 12' Port-a-
Bote with 2 aboard...(c; VERY DRY IN MODERATE CHOP, too! You don't HAVE
to arrive ashore lookin like a drowned rat.

In article ,
"Roger Long" wrote:

"Wayne.B" wrote

Half a knot is quite plausible going to windward in light air.

Does anybody do actually do that without the engine running?

I would have an inflatable myself if there wasn't a way to carry it on
deck for times like that or when the psychological effect of 1/8 knot
on a long beat feels burdensome out of proportion to the actual time
lost.

The difference, for me, is that we can sail lighter winds. Often we're
still doing 2-3 knots when everyone else is motoring or dead in the
water. And the decreased drag allows us to point better in more normal
air, valuable when we're fighting wind and current together.

We might be a little unusual though. We were out over 60 days last
season and used 13 gallons of fuel.

--
Jere Lull
Xan-a-Deux ('73 Tanzer 28 #4 out of Tolchester, MD)
Xan's Pages: http://members.dca.net/jerelull/X-Main.html
Our BVI FAQs (290+ pics) http://homepage.mac.com/jerelull/BVI/

On Thu, 12 Jan 2006 19:51:24 -0500, "TriciaJean192 at comcast dot net"
"TriciaJean192 at comcast dot net" wrote:



For what it's worth, we've run into several people using Porta-Botes as
dinghies and none are contemplating going back to an inflatable. On the
other hand, there are a few inflatable owners that are considering
switching to Portas when they get back to the states.

Interesting comments. The overall impression I'm getting is that the
Porta-Bote wins in quite a few, but by no means all, situations. For
under 30' boats as a dinghy, if you like a small engine, hate davits,
etc.

But I've heard that it's not quite rugged enough before, not in the
sense that it falls apart, but that the auxiliary stuff and seats are
not up to the quality of the folding hull itself.

I'll stick with my RIB, which is for me the best of both worlds. But I
would consider a PortaBote as a second tender I could stow if I could
get decent oars and a rugged seat.

Rowing a RIB can be done, but it ain't pretty.

THanks,
R.

"TriciaJean192 at comcast dot net" "TriciaJean192 at comcast dot net"
wrote in :

While we never have to pump up soft tubes, we do have to bail it out.


Fed up with bailing it, we got it a cordless bilge pump....(c;

Attwood Waterbuster cordless pump
http://www.boatersland.com/att41404.html

$35. The hose stores right around the pump. Alkalines are better than
rechargeables because rechargeables self-discharge at the wrong time, but
it will run on either. 5 hours on alkaline D cells is years of use.

Drop it in the stern, and flip the switch.

rhys wrote in news:efies190dsejg1kpj9sm9mkuji5lgblbmp@
4ax.com:

if you like a small engine

Speaking of engines. The 4-stroke dingy engine is a mistake. Damned
thing is just too much weight, too finicky having to lay it down in a
certain way to keep its oil from running out or to the wrong places, etc.
Not good on a motor you have to haul and unmount so much.

2-strokers don't have this malady. Try to buy one with a DIAPHRAM carb,
too that doesn't have a float bowl you have to empty before storage to
keep it from clogging the jets with shellac, another thing that screwed
our Nissan 4-stroke 5HP outboard. Gas in diaphram carbs doesn't spill
out, evaporate from air because there's no air in the diaphram and can be
used in any position, which is why your chain saw has one.

Ah, the simple pleasure of cranking an old Seagull you can fix yourself
in any cove on the planet.