Dock Protection

[JLR]

I will be acquiring a second home with a small floating dock. The dock will only be 20’ long suitable for a small (think 22’ boat). As of now, the dock is made of wood and has no rub rail or other protection on it. Rather than add traditional white vinyl or rubber stripping to the edge of the dock for 20’ which would still require fenders between the dock and the hull, I was thinking of another idea. How about adding two of three vertical pieces of PVC pipe (hopefully wrapped in something) and have the boat rub rail ride on the pipes rather than to ride on the dock edge? I have no outer poles to keep the boat off of the dock so some part of the boat will always be riding on something. Does that make sense and does anyone know whether this type of setup exists? I do not want to use whips. Thanks.

 

[lake of the woods]

I tried this in my dock for a 19 foot boat. the pvc tubes broke off easily in the wave action that battered the boat into the dock. I would suggest mooring whips first. They work great and are not that expensive ($175 - $225). You could also try 3 round inflatable bumpers for the boat to bounce off of.

Mark
Lake of the Woods
1989 40 DC

 

[sgharford]

My father has a floating dock we tied his 17 foot whaler to for close to 30 years. He added to 2 vertical slats of wood that extended about 2' off dock, and screwed strips of rubber bumper to length of each one. This worked fantastic, boat never rode up over dock and never marred the rub rail. We had whips prior and this worked allot better. The slats are also handy to grab onto when docking and/or getting out of boat.

 

[SEVEN]

While I was reading your post the first thing I thought of is that PVC with snap the moment you put a boat up against it. If your plan is to put PVC which is a good idea you’re first going to have to install pipe and then put PVC over the top of it that way it will hold. However I like the post above it seems much cheaper and it seems to work.

 

[JLR]

Thanks all. Keep the ideas coming.