I’m SUV hunting and the car I’m looking at has fixed points where a crossbar/Hullavator would mount. Normally I try to tie my 16 ft composite kayak in such a way that the hullavator straps hug the deck, not the coaming, but that’s impossible in this new scenario. Is the fiberglass cockpit coaming ok to strap over? Assume I’m applying typical arms-only force to cinch the cam straps, but I do like it tight for highway driving. Thx!
The positioning of my Prana in the Hullavator cradles has always resulted in a strap going over the rear cockpit coaming. No issues in the year I’ve had the boat. I do use a cockpit cover during transport.
Are the bars so close together that you can’t avoid strapping over the coaming? How much overlap are we talking about? If it’s just a few inches, you can still strap across the deck in front of or behind the coaming. The straps don’t have to go perfectly straight over the boat.
Not seeing how much localized pressure is pushing down on the coaming just wondering if any benefit would be gained in adding temporary support between the coaming and the deck in the form of stiff foam tubes or such to distribute some of the force to the deck.
I have done it without any problem, but admittedly not as a constant thing. Between my height and having long boats it is almost as likely that I will have to shorten the distance for the Hullivator as want to go longer so I avoid cars with fixed rail positions.
I can always finagle ONE strap to be just fore or aft of the coaming, but that’ll guarantee the other is over the cockpit. The Sisu cockpit is an elongated egg shape, a bit more so than other keyholes.
@AlwaysWet said:
I can always finagle ONE strap to be just fore or aft of the coaming, but that’ll guarantee the other is over the cockpit. The Sisu cockpit is an elongated egg shape, a bit more so than other keyholes.
Ditto with the Prana. I can try to get the aft strap under the coaming but it always slides forward. I figure it’s better to have the forward strap under the cockpit rim as I’m more apt to do a sudden stop driving forward than backward. On the other hand, I can position my Fathom LV so both straps are under the cockpit rim.
The Prana cockpit is 32 x 16.50; the Fathom is 31.50 x 16.50. Both boats have a 21" beam.
My experience with the Hulivator is that the cradles are too wide and high for our sea kayaks and the straps don’t put a lot of “down” pressure on the boats. We’ve been crossing the cockpit combings of both sea kayaks for about 15,000 miles with no combing damage.
If there is no other way to strap the boat down, I would take a couple of old socks and jam them under the coaming where the strap crosses the coaming to support the outside edge of the coaming. Strap pressure on the coaming could eventually damage it in time. You never know when you might encounter a hard bump that could exponentially increase the strain on the coaming.
Thanks for the input, all. Feels like I should favor on-deck strapping for the fore cockpit and let the aft strap go over the coaming. Not my preference but, gotta make do, nothing is one size fits all.