Hi There, I’m looking for an affordable yet heavy-duty Kayak cart in the market. My preferences are it should be lightweight, durable, solid material and foldable. Any recommendations?
What sort of surfaces is it important that it roll well on? Does it need to fit inside your hatches? If so what size and shape are your hatches?
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Generally one that has this configuration is popular with our clubs. I don’t know anything about this particular cart…except I like the price.
Kick stands are often different. Some use straps I do since we often roll in grass and the boats can slide off . But at the canoe club you can over close grass go without.
Sand on the beach is a more difficult problem. We rarely carry it on the boat. Hence Chodups question doesn’t affect our operations. But would require a slightly different cart.
C Tug is great
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Depends on the surface you are rolling on. The above that are useful for others are useless here on the rocky coast of Maine or on portages.
We need high ground clearance to go over rocks and roots so a Swedish cart works well. LL Bean has one from Seattle Sports.
I use a Trailtrekker kayak cart & love it. You can see videos on Youtube of the cart being used to transport a kayak over logs and stones. Breaks down in less than a minute for storage. Here’s a link to the sales site: http://paddlelogic.com/trailtreker-kayak-carts.html
Another consideration is how far you will be carting your boat. If you get a cart that attaches to the rear of your boat it’s probably great for ease of attachment and short distances (like parking lot to launch point) but if you need to cover distance you’ll be doing a lot of work since you have to carry the weight of the front of the boat as well as drag it along. If you have to cover some distance you may well prefer a cart that goes in the middle of the boat and carries all the weight. I have a suspenz sd airless and it’s not light and it doesn’t fold but it works well for my use.
Here’s another nice looking cart design that recently popped up on another forum.
Paddlecart.com fits the heavy duty piece. I used a swedish cart until it rusted through from saltwater exposure over a few years of regular use. I could not fit that in a kayak hatch though. It did have a very solid kick stand, is heavy duty, accomadates center- mount, and rolls easily.
The paddlecart.com cart comes apart to fit into any standard Kajaksport or Valley or CD fiberglass oval hatches. It won’t fit into the round openings. It’s not particularly light, but light compared to the swedish cart. It is heavy duty. I generally use it as a center-mount cart, so I don’t have to support any weight. It rolls easily - like bicycle tires, so if you’re walking or running with your kayak for a couple miles to and from the put-in/take out, it’s brilliant. I use a single long webbing strap - around one side of the cart, around the rear of the coaming, around the other side of the cart, around the front of the coaming. I have narrow sea kayaks, so I also put two webbing straps across the ends of the padded support bars. It keeps narrow kayaks from resting down on the AL bars. It does not have a kickstand.
So it really shines in terms of heavy duty, easy rolling, packs nicely into oval hatches, corrosion resistance, wear resistance, bigger diameter wheels offer good clearance and handle rough terrain.
It does not have a kickstand, (which may or may not make much difference to you), and with size and heavy duty comes a little weight, and you may have to add a couple webbing straps for narrow kayaks.
For me and the distances I’ve used it over the years, the heavy duty center mount capability, ease of rolling, ability to easily pack it into any stern hatch with oval opening, and corrosion-free aluminum construction have made it my favorite cart. And it’s made in the USA. Just used mine this morning.
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Hopefully these pictures come through. So there is a pin for each wheel, a pin for each padded bar, and from the hardware store, two pieces of webbing with two clips to go with them for narrow kayaks. I just figured I could illustrate what I meant by that.
@CapeFear What is the clearance height of that cart? My kayak cart with bigger wheels etc finally had a failure that doesn’t justify the effort for a permanent fix. Its overall condition is not so hot, and it is old enough not to owe me anything. Need to secure a long term replacement before spring.
I have found that the NRS Yak Yak is a good cart for me. It folds down and wheels are easily removable and it will fit inside all of my kayaks. It is good on sand and mud, ok on rocky pebbles. There are 2 sizes available, I have the smaller one, my largest kayak is 23" wide with 8" hatch covers.
It has 12" wheels, and ends up 5 3/4" clearance. The bottom of a narrow v-hull will sit 15" up on top of the webbing straps as I have it configured.
Thanks. That’s about what I have now. I know at low tide a path exists to the Talic stands in the beach in Maine that avoids taller rocks. But it requires planning - thinking for the next cart I want to be able to run more of a straight path at the end of a paddle.
Thanks very helpful. I’m going for either TMS Cart or Bonnlo. Some helpful review here. TMS is more preferable because of its light weight. However, the Bonnlo looks more durable with thew 12" wheels as compared to the 9.5" of TMS. When it comes to budget, the Bonnlo is 50% more pricy than the TMS. 
I don’t think you should go with cheap option because I have bad experience with cheap carts. That’s why recently, we got Ctug kayak cart and yes, it can carry near about 300lbs and you would love its puncture free wheels. You can also consider Suspenz Smart because of their airless tyres but their capacity of carrying weight is only about 125lbs.
If you have to go through lots of sand, C-tug is the way to go. Works great on hard surfaces too.
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C-tug is very good choice.Its axles are of stainless steel and thus work best in all terrains without any trouble.You can go for C-tug
Built my own for $40! Removable handle for easier transport … used a drop pin to keep it in place when it use.
I built one very similar to yours, following the instructions here:
I made the pieces labeled G a few inches longer so I could pull my Hobie Revolution 13 more easily over varied terrain without the other end scraping the ground.
Unfortunately, one of the four top pieces that go fore-and-aft broke clean off after about 4 or 5 months of almost every-other-day use. I think this was partly because my handle/brace was not at the best angle. When I first put the kayak on, the weight was all at one end until I cinched up the rope I was using in lieu of a strap. And sure enough when I first put the kayak on was when it broke. Of course, the 2017 Revo 13 is also pretty heavy - 70.5 pounds hull weight and 88 pounds rigged weight.
[Gear Review: C-Tug]
(https://thcc.clubexpress.com/content.aspx?page_id=22&club_id=496051&module_id=251067)