Just bought my first Kayak. I can only store it my car port which has a metal gate but several tenants in our building use it. So it isn’t that secure.
It seems to me that my best option is a really good lock and chain combination secured to the gate of the carport.
Does anybody have any other suggestions?
Or suggestions for locks and chains?
Thanks,
Abba
Does the boat have a steel loop?
If it does it’s real easy to lock it down if not they’re not hard to add. Note it’s cheaper to buy the parts at West Marine or a hardware store than to buy a kit at a kayak store. You need the following all in stainless steel; u-bolt (1/4" x 2" x 3" deep or so), a flat bar slotted to go across the u-bolt, 4-flat washers, 4- nylock nuts. Also a single cable with a small loop at each end is easier to tie the boat down than using a chain.
Or buy or make a set of lasso’s two vinyl coated cables with a small loop at one end and a large loop at the other. The small loop should slide well over the bow the other over the stern and stop about the hatch. Put one cable over each end wrap ALL the slack around a roof rack, post or whatever and your as secure as you can be. Neither system is totally foolproof but what is.
One more idea, write or engrave your name/phone # in a visible place like on the bulkhead behind your seat. Then again in an hidden location like under the seat or inside a hatch, If the boat is lost/stolen it will improve your chances, this worked for a friend.
Good Luck
Randy
oops
The second sentence of second paragraph should say large loop will slide over bow or stern. Small loops are just big enough to easily accomodate a padlock. Sometimes I type faster than I think and I don’t type very fast.
Randy
How big is the boat?..
…if it’s a small WW play boat, I’d take it
inside. I’ve known people who would hoist them
up to a 3rd story balcony.
I knew a guy in alexandria, Va who would take a
17 ft touring boat in and out of his apt window.
I had a 9’8" old school creek boat I dragged in
and out of the same apt.
Or perhaps there is one of those storage rental
places around.
As a final, very long shot, if you live anywhere near Cinci, Columbus, or Dayton Ohio, you’d be
more than welcome to store it with my boats. You’d just have to bring a dog biscuit for the security guards!
ELF-I’VE MADE SEVERAL CABLES FOR
securing the fleet…
Used the coated cable for the glass & Trylon boats, uncoated for the plastic ones. Used a crimper at the hardware store to loop the ends -it crimped only when I put my then 200#, plus an 8-10# sledge I was holding, putting all the weight full on it without my legs on the floor. And when you do make the loops, be sure to make the loop small enough to fit thru the scupper!
I’ve got 3 cables about 20’ or so long -I loop one end thru itself, and loop THAT loop around the stern of my SINK. Then I run the cable to the bow, and loop it to a second, very short cable that barely fits around the bow, with the long cable stretched taut, and lock all 3 end loops -the two from the shot cable encircling the bow, and the one stretched from the stern -together. That prevents either loop from being slipped off over the ends.
I lock THAT cable to another that links our 2 SINKs, and the glass Isthmus SOT (no scuppers) together, and which is long enough to go thru the scuppers of our 3 OK SOTs, and the two end loops of that cable are locked to a cable that’s wrapped around my kayak rack and then locked to the fencepost.
I got a bike lock, but most are only about 6’ long, and I needed MUCH longer -so I made my own, You CAN buy one about 25’ long, but it goes for around $30, plus or minus, and my cables are almost as good and a lot cheaper.
And always go with wire-strand cable, stainless if you can afford it, coated likewise: bolt cutters can go thruogh chain, even fairly HD chain, with one or two got pumps.
Cutting cable with boltcutters is a real B!TCH!!! And it responds about as well to a hacksaw… it’s an awful lot of grunt work.
As noted above, it keeps the casual crook from competing -but the true thief will take your stuff.
But this method provides about as much security -other that the same setup but hidden out of sight behind closed (& locked) doors -as you can want to keep your stuff safe to
Paddle On!
-Scupper Pro Frank