correct roller setup

[doomedjest]

Looking for some advice on setting up my roller trailer correctly for my boat. I bought the boat and trailer combo last year and have been slowly going through and correcting the maintenance things on both the boat and the trailer. On my list of things is to replace the keel roller in the front and also all of the rollers on the trailer since most of them are starting to come apart in the center. What I want to do is make sure that I have the position and spacing of the roller correct when I change the rollers. The previous owner complained that the boat was hard to load on the trailer and let me tell you he was right! I am almost always going to have to load the boat in a cross current and I definitely need both practice and also the trailer to work better for me. I realize the the keel roller is worn out which is allowing the bow of the boat to be lower than it should be which in turn appears to be binding the inner most forward rollers against the trailer frame. The other issue that I see is that on the same rack the outer rollers end up being on the chine. Should I try and adjust the front rollers out a little more to bridge the chine on either side? I gather if I do that I would need to add an additional Keel roller to make sure the bow doesn't hit the trailer. Also What rollers do most people like...the Tie down engineering ones or Stotz...or some other brand I haven't heard of?

thanks for the help!

 

[smokeonthewater]

Having studied your pics I'd say that trailer is a poor match for that boat.... Your outer rollers are hitting the strake (not chine) and need moved inboard but of course the inner rollers won't allow this... If you move them out past the chine then all rollers will ride on their edges which is not acceptable.... About the only possible solution would be to have much larger diameter rollers on the inboard positions than the outboard positions so you could bridge the strake and have the rollers square to the hull.... either that or modify/fabricate new arms to deal with the offset....

Honestly your best bet is probably to either source a used trailer that fits the hull or as much as I hate to say it, remove the roller assys and mount two bunks a few inches inside the strakes.... They COULD be roller bunks if you want tho.

As for the keel roller. self centering keel rollers DO work REALLY well. Very much worth the few extra dollars.

 

[smokeonthewater]

IF you are of a mind to modify the roller trucks, I'd say thee arms on them could be heated and bent such that the rollers sat square on the uneven surfaces on both sides of the strakes but you would need to do some careful figuring..... IE can the strake hit steel between the rollers, will the keel hit the trailer frame if the rollers are moved out.... Obviously the trucks need removed from the trailer and the rollers taken off to do this and they all have to end up identical.... If not done correctly they may not track right causing the boat to load poorly or worse yet they could fail all together causing damage to the boat so this wouldn't be a project for a complete novice metalworker.

 

[bonz_d]

nice old shoreland'r trailer. Too bad it doesn't fit well on that tri-hull. Really. There is nothing wrong with the trailer that a little maintenance and paint wouldn't fix. Unfortunately there isn't a lot of adjustment with it and it doesn't lend it's self well with the contours of that hull. You could watch craigslist as more often I'm seeing used roller bunks for sale by people converting to bunks. What you should watch for are the ones that will adjust the spacing of the rollers on each axle. Just remember that the farther out you move the inside rollers the lower it is going to sit on the trailer.

 

[JimS123]

The single most important component of a boat, motor & trailer combination is the trailer. If it don't fit right it could damage the hull. More importantly, launching problems take all the fun out of boating. You start and end the day in a bad mood.

I've only bought one used trailer in my 50+ years of boating. For what it cost me to upgrade it to make it work, I could have bought a new trailer. Eventually I did.

Skip the craigslist and go to a boat dealer for a new trailer. Then sell the old one for $200 and you'll be ahead.

 

[doomedjest]

Thanks everyone for the ideas so far
​
At this point I am planning on trying to get what I have to work instead of either buying a different trailer or a brand new trailer for a 30 year old boat

I had completely missed the fact that I would need to make up for the difference in elevation between the two sides of the strakes and I would definitely need to bend the metal of the arm to make up for that and I never got around to buying an acetylene torch....

One of the things I was wondering is that I think there are a few things I could do to the rollers themselves. One would be to switch to the rollers other than the Yates rollers, this would net me 1.25 inches narrower per roller so a total of 1.25 inches per set to the outer width. In addition to the narrower roller surface there is a spacer between the roller and the washer on the inside of the arm. If i move the spacer to the outside it would move the roller towards the center of the arm, again reducing the overall width of the roller arm. Unfortunately to test this would cost at a minumum 34 bucks for a set of the tie down engineering rollers.

 

[doomedjest]

No Title

Figured I would post up the work that I did on the trailer. The original rollers were rock hard and a few of them weren't close to round anymore. I found a real good deal on seasense 4" rollers and bought the full set of 16. This past weekend I changed all the rollers on the boat including the keel roller. The new rollers provided the room I needed to clear everything, Strake and the center line of the trailer, though I will be putting a few washers in the front center rollers to make sure that they don't hit the trailer. Anyway, here's the result:

 

[bonz_d]

Looks like it should work. Good job!

 

[64osby]

Nice! Great job making it work to fit your needs. That and not spending a ton of cash.