Custom Boat Loader- Our experience
Below is an account of our experience with our custom boat loader.
PLEASE NOTE, THESE ARE JUST OUR EXPERIENCES AND YOUR SITUATION IS LIKELY TO BE DIFFERENT FROM OURS. HOW SO, DIFFERENT BOAT,CAR,EXPECTATIONS AND WHERE YOU WANT TO GO.
We purchased our loader earlier this year and it was shipped from
Perth in a timely manner to the installer Hugh Dunbar of
Hazard Engineering in
Adelaide .
We decided to go for a loader wider than we needed for the boat we had chosen, in case we ever wished to move up to a large boat, as at the time we had not put our new tinny in the water and were unsure if it was going to be big enough and stable enough. Now we have used the boat, 3.75 Topper Tracker Mako Craft 75Kg, formerly Stessl, we are very happy with the handling and stability from such a small boat.
Before delivery I went and purchased a new Makita drill to operate the loader unfortunately I was told that a 10mm chuck would be ok, as it turned out I needed a 13mm chuck and a very powerful drill.
I ended up buying a 750 watt Metabo drill with a 13mm chuck and fully reversible. You can use an adaptor in a 10mm chuck but I found it vibrated and wobbled too much.
Hugh turned out to be a really nice guy deal with and nothing was too much trouble. This was fortunate as I had to return to him to have the ropes re-adjusted and a leaking gearbox replaced. Once notified the crew at Custom Boat Loaders had one sent over in a flash and replaced at no cost. In hindsight I would probably have gone for the remote control unit.
I will try to put the rest in point form. These are the good and bad points FROM OUR POINT OF VIEW.
? Dianne & Bill are great people to deal with
? The rack is VERY
well made
? Relatively light,45kg, I think
? Allows one person to load and un-load quite a heavy boat from a high vehicle by themselves
? Good tie down points, I found ONCE the boat was loaded on straight with the ropes properly adjusted and strapped down it didn’t move on the loader
? As it is an all alloy product there are no rust issue’s with the unit itself
? When finished un-loading by myself I find if I spin the ropes back on they become out of adjustment, this is because there is no load on them.
? To spin the ropes of the loader by yourself without them being under load can be a problem
? If the ropes are out of adjustment the boat will pull up or lower unevenly, when loading this can mean when tightened the boat will pull sideways on the roof and sit unevenly necessitating the boat to be unloaded again.
? In order for the boat to pivot of the rear bumper the hitch needs to be removed and a plate inserted, this is a pain for us as we have a pinch bolt, so this means spanners and getting under the car
? We found the width of the loader a real pain in tight bush and it caused considerable stress , not only did I not wish to damage the boat or load this was secondary in my mind to getting hooked on a large tree and bending the car roof
? I’m Five 11” and need to stand on a stool to hold the drill to unload the boat (Troopy)
? As above the height was an issue and meant we had to take the boat of the roof to get down many tracks while still facing the width issue.
? We were disappointed with what we could load on the roof under the boat. The demo video we had seen showed the boat dropping onto the roof right at the end of the loading process. This is not the case with our boat, therefore with the boat sliding most of the way we are very limited with what we can carry on the rack. There is also not much width to be used due to the loading ropes.
? With a raised up Troopy we found fuel economy not as affected as one might expect, but it is like driving a wind sock and you get blown everywhere.
? With 10k under its belt the rack has been removed as we aren’t traveling at the moment, I was very disappointed to see the amount of paint removed down both sides of the roof. Had the rack been left on for a year of two this would have lead to substantial rust. I wasn’t really surprised as you could hear the loader creaking on the roof. I kept the brackets tight at all times. The paint removed may not have been directly from the loader touching the roof but organic matter stuck in between the rack and the roof and the rack moving. Have had an ARB rack before and lost very little paint.
Well that sums that up. As you can see some of these issues are specific to a Custom rack, MANY are not.
I hope this give people an idea of what they are up for should the choose to put a boat on the roof of their car, many of the problems I faced will be found with any rack and quite possibly more with other brands of loaders.
Regards Lyndon Kain