jax said
It also takes upwards of an hour to
assemble from scratch on deck (including getting together the three seats and
transom from down below, the bag of hardware, twisting it up on deck,
assembling, rigging a hardness to attach to the main halyard, putting into
water, mounting the engine, getting fuel can and safety gear)

Parallax wrote:
The Porta-bote really takes an hour?

This is a question that has been debated before. Jax always says an
hour or so, most of us say significantly less. We've got a 12'
Porta-Bote that lives on the coach roof.
http://rangerbest.home.comcast.net/PortaCover.JPG
http://rangerbest.home.comcast.net/PortaBote.JPG
It's very rare for me to set it up or put it away alone, but when I
do it wouldn't surprise me if it took a 1/2 an hour or even more from
the time I start getting the bits and pieces out to when I'm in the boat
and moving under power. Usually though, my wife and I are working
together and the most time consuming part, getting the bits & pieces out
on deck or storing them away, goes at least twice as fast as when
working alone since the one down below is just handing things up to the
one on deck instead of making many trips carrying them.

I've never actually timed it, but I think our typical unhurried time is
more like 15-20 minutes working together and may be a little less. The
actual assembly time for the boat is only a few minutes. Really no time
at all. It's getting the seats, transom, oars, miracle assembly stick
and bailer out of the bottomless pit locker, then getting the little
tupperware thing with the pins in it out of the nav. station,
remembering where the plastic bow piece got stashed (though in truth, we
usually don't bother with it), oh yeah, don't forget the rubber mallet.
Are we going to need the dinghy anchor? "Honey, I can't find the plastic
'key' for the outboard. Have you seen it anywhere?" You get the picture.

We also have an older 10' Avon that hasn't been out of the garage since
we got the Porta-Bote 2 1/2 years ago.

If you're interested in why we love our Porta-Bote so much after having
used the inflatable for years, I'll be happy to wax eloquently off line,
but most of the people who hang out here have heard me sing its' praises
before.

Take care - Dan
--
Dan Best - (707) 431-1662, Healdsburg, CA 95448
B-2/75 1977-1979
Tayana 37 #192, "Tricia Jean"
http://rangerbest.home.comcast.net/TriciaJean.JPG

I agree with Jax. Putting the portabote together athwart the cabin top
is a time consuming PIA. With practice, we've gotten it down to 40
min. Having said that, it beats towing. The trade off is that, due to
laziness, we tend not to assemble the dinghy if we are only going to
be in a given port ovenight. Longer stays are worth the effort.




On Wed, 31 Mar 2004 11:53:11 GMT, wrote:

On 31 Mar 2004 04:38:47 GMT, (JAXAshby) wrote:

It takes me about 20-30 minutes the first time of the season -- mostly
figuring things out again and working against the stiffness. After that,
it's 10-15 minutes to set up or down

all things in a pile on the shore, yup.

On the deck on my boat with seats, transom down below along with bolting
hardwar, plus engine on the rear pulpit of my boat, plus the gas tank for the
o/b engine, plus safety gear, plus rigging the harness to lift the Porta-Bote
off my boat, plus lowering the bote, plus all else, well the time is a mite
longer than on shore.


Sounds more like you are very disorganized and inept. It would take you an hour
to get any dinghy in the water, based on your descriptiion.

BB

??? The last time my wife timed me, it took me almost 7 minutes to
assemble the boat on the foredeck by myself. Are you missing an arm?

no, he is missing your bullsquat.



BB

That's about average for pinning the seats and installing the transom.
Let's add as few steps to that:
-Gathering parts
-Padding Cabin Top
-securing boom out of the way
-Moving Hull to assembly location
-propping hull open
-pinning seats and installing transom
-installing bow piece, painter and lock cable
-rigging sling and launching dinghy
-installing motor and fuel can
-collecting and installing anchor and safety gear
-restablishing order on mother ship

Yeah, forty minutes is about right.
As for my missing arm, I specifically asked Bob not to tell any one.
Very cruel BB











On Wed, 31 Mar 2004 14:17:46 GMT, wrote:

On Wed, 31 Mar 2004 13:19:05 GMT, Marc wrote:

I agree with Jax. Putting the portabote together athwart the cabin top
is a time consuming PIA. With practice, we've gotten it down to 40
min. Having said that, it beats towing. The trade off is that, due to
laziness, we tend not to assemble the dinghy if we are only going to
be in a given port ovenight. Longer stays are worth the effort.



??? The last time my wife timed me, it took me almost 7 minutes to
assemble the boat on the foredeck by myself. Are you missing an arm?

BB




On Wed, 31 Mar 2004 11:53:11 GMT, wrote:

On 31 Mar 2004 04:38:47 GMT, (JAXAshby) wrote:

It takes me about 20-30 minutes the first time of the season -- mostly
figuring things out again and working against the stiffness. After that,
it's 10-15 minutes to set up or down

all things in a pile on the shore, yup.

On the deck on my boat with seats, transom down below along with bolting
hardwar, plus engine on the rear pulpit of my boat, plus the gas tank for the
o/b engine, plus safety gear, plus rigging the harness to lift the Porta-Bote
off my boat, plus lowering the bote, plus all else, well the time is a mite
longer than on shore.


Sounds more like you are very disorganized and inept. It would take you an hour
to get any dinghy in the water, based on your descriptiion.

BB

It weighs 50 pounds, Marc! I pick it up and drop it over the
lifelines.

bb, you just pegged the bs meter. A 12 foot Porta-Bote weighs 89 pounds, PLUS
the (3, not 2 as you stated) seats PLUS the transom. The total is a lot closer
to 120 pounds or more.

btw, you don't just tie the bote to the lifelines, you also tied the bote
tightly before taking it to the lifelines to store. the bote is stiff and half
opens up on its own if you don't tie it together.

btw, the VAST majority of Porta-Botes are the 12 foot model, with most of the
rest being 10 feet. Very few 8 foot Porta-Botes out there. In fact, I have
never seen one. 12's and 10's have three seats. only the 8 has two seats.
the 8 footer is considered too small to use for more than one person under most
conditions, and the 10 and 12's are very little more money.

Boy, what a contentious issue. Just how long does it take to erect a Porta-Bote
anyway?

In our case, it probably takes us about a half hour to do the whole job aboard
our Ericson 38. So I can well agree with folks who say from 20 to 40 min. But
in my yard at home, with the parts nearby, I can probably do the job in 5
minutes. The difference is how long it takes to get everything set up and
hauled out of storage.

If someone says they can rig their inflatable in just 5 minutes, is that 5
minutes of just pumping, or does that include getting the boat out of storage?
When are you starting the clock?

And what’s with all the insults? Just because someone else takes longer to put
his together doesn’t make him an incompetent idiot.

Someone wrote:

-Padding Cabin Top
-securing boom out of the way

To which silver tongued BinaryBill replied:

Padding what? Securing what?

Well Bill, on my two sailboats, if I didn’t put down padding on the deck or
cabin house I would leave black marks everywhere from the black tubes. You
don’t have to do this, but it helps, and it adds an extra step.

And on my older boat (a Precision 23) the only place to erect the boat was on
the cabin house over the companionway. And to do that I had to move the boom
over to one side, just like the earlier skipper. Which takes several extra
steps to release the mainsheet and such.

This other skipper also wrote:

-rigging sling and launching dinghy

To which the ever tolerant and understanding BinaryBill replied:

It weighs 50 pounds, Marc! I pick it up and drop it over the
lifelines.

From the top of my lifelines to the water is close to 7 feet on my boat, which
is further than I care to drop the boat. Which is why I too use a lifting sling
to launch the boat, which takes up another part of that 30 minutes.

BinaryBill went on to insult a few more folks, underestimate the weight of his
boat, and generally show that he is so insecure that he has to be right about
everything. But if he can do all this in "WAY under 10 minutes," then he is
obviously a superior sailor to everyone else on usenet, and we should all
recognize him as such! (Maybe then he will shut up.)

Steve Christensen

bb, you don't have a Porta-Bote.

It weighs 50 pounds, Marc! I pick it up and drop it over the
lifelines.

bb, you just pegged the bs meter. A 12 foot Porta-Bote weighs 89 pounds,
PLUS
the (3, not 2 as you stated) seats PLUS the transom. The total is a lot
closer
to 120 pounds or more.

My 8 foot portabote weighs 50 pounds completely assembled with seats
and transome installed.


btw, you don't just tie the bote to the lifelines, you also tied the bote
tightly before taking it to the lifelines to store. the bote is stiff and
half
opens up on its own if you don't tie it together.

Incorrect. I lash it to the lifelines with two webbed straps as I
stated. You seem to have great trouble with very simple tasks. Do you
have rickets or something?


btw, the VAST majority of Porta-Botes are the 12 foot model, with most of
the
rest being 10 feet. Very few 8 foot Porta-Botes out there.

Really? Perhaps you better tell Portabote that. They seem to think the
8 footer is very popular.

In fact, I have
never seen one.

You've already shown that you are not very observant, or a reliable
witness.

12's and 10's have three seats. only the 8 has two seats.
the 8 footer is considered too small to use for more than one person under
most
conditions,

How odd! I ferry three adults, and their gear all the time. With just
me in the boat it planes when powered by my mighty Minnkota electric
motor.

and the 10 and 12's are very little more money.

But they take up far more room. We are talking about use as a tender
for a relatively small (under 35 feet) cruising sailboat. A 12 foot
ANYTHING would be dopey for that purpose. I guess that explains you
pretty well.

BB

"Parallax" wrote in message


The Porta-bote really takes an hour? My god, my Nautilus 8 only takes
5 minutes to hoist off h deck with halyard and over the lifelines into
the water. Maybe 10 minutes total to be ready with oars.
Maybe I will continue o live with the Nautilus and inflatable kayak.


Seems like you are making a comparison between oranges and apples.

If you wanted to leave the Porta-bote assembled and stowed on deck then it
would deploy in a matter of minutes as well. If you are going to pack up
the inflatable and stow it below decks then I bet it would take more than 10
minutes to have it ready for launch.

How long it takes to go from the most compact storage to fully operational
will vary greatly on the style of the inflatable. I used to have an
inflatable that had and inflatable keel and plywood floor. Getting the keel
in place and the floorboards properly positioned with the
stiffening/connecting boards installed was a real bitch. I could spend
hours on it working in the driveway, I would hate to try it on the deck of a
boat.

A friend had an inflatable that had "slats" as the floorboards that just
rolled up. I didn't care for that boat at all and he ended up getting rid
of it a year later because it basically sucked. Good stiff floorboards make
a huge difference in how an inflatable planes and the roll up floors just
don't perform well.

There is a "high pressure inflatable" floor system that might be okay, but I
have never actually known anyone who has one of these.

I know several people who have Porta-botes. One friend keeps his folded up
on the dock. When he wants to use it he just lays it down (he stows it
standing up, folded thin), folds down the seats (I think that locks the
beam) puts his outboard on and he is ready to go.

At the marina where I keep my boats there is a live-aboard who has a
porta-bote that he keeps in the water all the time. I know that he has had
that boat, in the water, for the last 6 years. He puts around the marina in
it all the time, and I occasionally see him zipping down the channel at a
fairly good clip being pushed by his 6 HP outboard. His Porta-bote
outlasted my last inflatable!

I still prefer an inflatable for my own needs, but I have a lot of respect
for those Porta-botes.

Rod McInnis

Steve Christensen wrote

And what?s with all the insults? Just because someone else takes longer to put
his together doesn?t make him an incompetent idiot.

it does in Bills' case.

Steve Christensen wrote

And what?s with all the insults? Just because someone else takes longer to put
his together doesn?t make him an incompetent idiot.

it does in Bills' case.