We have been testing the rope ladder on the side of our 36’ Islander Freeport sail boat. So far it has
been pretty useless. It hurts the feet to try to climb it. It is hard to stay
balanced. We put some 1 1\2” sanitary rubber hose on some of the adder with
wire test hoping to keep it off the side of the boat some.
I was in the water and tried to climb the ladder. The bottom rungs went under the side of the boat below the water line and I cut my toe on a barnacle. Guess we need a bottom cleaning!
All in all it was not good. I did eventually get up but not
for the every or even occasional use.
The hoses did not help.
Next time we will try amidships where the hull is flatter
and there are stays where we can attach a line for grabbing on the way up. Also while on the paddleboard I can grab my "get wet shoes" from the deck and climb up the swim ladder with them on, not hurting my feet.
I don't understand why you're going to all that trouble when you can use the built in transom drop down steps?
ReplyDeleteThere are several reasons why we want to use the swim ladder on the side.
ReplyDeleteWhen you lower the stern steps with the dinghy on the davits the davits become a bit week.
The stern rail is weak.
The stern steps even with a fender on them can bang in a swell which is common in the Rivera. We always pull them up out of the water using the block and tackle we have set up for this and tie them off. We cannot do this with the dinghy up.
The stern steps do not pas under the dinghy, the dinghy needs to be pushed and shoved to get the steps by it. That is a davits issue and a stern rail issue for another discussion.
I like to just drop the paddleboard into the water and then jump in and go paddle. Come back flip the swim steps over the rail and climb back up to the boat or just leave the swim steps in the water when leaving. So far that has not worked.
Maybe a hard ladder hanging off the boat would work better than a rope ladder?
DeleteDon