bought a boat (18’ fiberglass). right now it has rollers on the trailer. i plan to do a complete overhaul on the trailer and wondering if i should stick with rollers or convert to bunk. or, do half bunk and half roller. i wont be docking the boat at all, trailering every time i go out. i dont see myself driving the boat onto the trailer, just floating it on and winching with the crank the rest of the way. i seem to get about a 50/50 on preference when searching.
Keep it with the rollers for sure. My last boat had a roller trailer and it was pretty great. Especially if you’re going to hand-crank it on.
Roller
---------- Post added at 10:36 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:35 PM ----------
Especially if you have shallow launches and or tow with a smaller truck/car
Bunk, hands down. We have deep ramps here in WNY so with a bunk trailer you can float on, float off. None of this silly cranking nonsense I see the roller trailer guys having to do.
With my bunk trailer I can disconnect the straps/winch before backing in. I just hand the dock lines to the wife, back in until I see the boat start to float, then pull forward. Never even have to leave the truck launching. Try that with a roller and you’re likely to have the boat roll off the trailer before its in the water.
Retrieving is almost as easy. Back down so the trailer is just above the point where the boat would float off. Hop in the boat and idle it up onto the trailer. The bunks will center it and it stops about 1’ from the bow stop. Use the winch and with one hand easily crank it that last foot.
The only place a roller has the advantage is launching at really shitty ramps where you can’t get the boat to float off. I’ve launched all over this state and have yet to find a ramp where I wanted a roller trailer.
I agree. I see people struggling with roller trailers all the time. Yesterday there was a guy struggling to get his 26’ boat straight for about 20 minutes at the launch and finally gave up and pulled it out way off. With steep launches it’s really difficult to keep the back lined up when pulling out.
While I don’t disagree that bunk trailers are easy as well, I wouldn’t convert the trailer. I would just keep as-is. I don’t think there is THAT much advantage either way. I say that having owned both (currently on a bunk, last boat was a roller).
You’ll never get back the money that you put into the trailer. It’s the unsung hero.
I don’t have any pictures of mine without the boat on it, but this is the setup to have on a small boat (15-25’):
Trailmaster, exact same design as mine. I know you said the trailer on the one you got needs quite a bit of work so if you’re already tearing it all up now is a great time to make it into something useful. If you’re going to launch/retrieve each time having a trailer that works properly is essential to enjoying your boat.
It’s self centering, easy loading/unloading and the boats sits low on the trailer so it’s stable as hell at highway speed.
ive only used bunk before, however i can see the advantage of rollers. i guess you dont back a roller in as far as a bunk and thats why people have a hard time lining them up?
ill be towing with a 2011 ram so the issue of having a smaller tow vehicle doesnt really play in.
the part i worry about with bunk is the possibilty of them wearing on the bottom of the hull, and the part i worry about with rollers is people say it dimples the bottom of hulls. although this one seems to be on a roller its whole life and i dont see any dimples.
this is the boat i got. its a '77 wriedt stinger jet drive. used to have a ford bb 460 bored 60 over with tunnel ram, dual carbs, and nitrous injection. back of the hull says “blood, sweat, & nitrous” previous owner said it did over 80mph with that setup. its left hand drive with a gas pedal. ill be putting a big block chevy in it.
After seeing the pictures, I’d consider swapping that to a bunk. Good roller trailers have A LOT more rollers to get the boat centered and stable on the trailer.
With good bunk carpeting, you will have no issues with the bunks damaging the bottom of the boat.
If you want you can come check out the bottom of my 12 year old Chaparral that has been launch/retrieved on average at least once a week from May till Oct. Not a mark on it from the bunks. Gotta remember that the bunks are carpeted and you 95% of the weight of the boat is supported by the water when it’s being dragged onto the bunks (and it floats off).
Can’t wait to see your project thread for that jetboat. Just a heads up, you probably won’t enjoy that thing much on the weekends. Nowhere near enough deadrise in that hull to deal with all the chop from the traffic. It’s going to pound like crazy. Weeknights when there’s less traffic it’s going to be a blast though.
We’ve got a boatmate like this one now:
A good roller trailer looks more like this. Notice there are a lot more rollers toward the front to help line the boat up as it comes up.
^ Ski boat? Can’t have much deadrise since there are no rollers in the middle.
Yeah our new boat is a wakeboard boat with a V-Drive Inboard. My old boat was a center console outboard (roller trailer).
I agree based on where you keep it as is.
Unless you’re towing with a kia that can’t get it deep enough off the ramp without sinking the car
yeah the trailer only has 16 rollers. the trailer is an older ezloader. boxed frame, 1-1/16 stepped bearings, bearing buddys, 14" wheels. not bad shape but definitely needs some work.
so the general opinion is to switch to bunk? im tempted to build a whole new trailer or make some major modifications to this one as i want the boat to sit lower on it.
For me it would depend on what kind of shape the roller mechanisms were in. If they’re all mess up, not rolling, needing to be replaced etc I’d switch it to bunks. If they’re all working fine I’d just sand it down, prime it and hit with with some paint. Look at the pictures of the bunk trailers that were posted. It’s not exactly rocket science to put bunks on a trailer. If you can weld or know someone who can it’s just a matter of installing a few brackets and covering some pressure treated 2x6’s in outdoor carpet.
Bunk works fine, and has no moving parts. :tup:
i realize its easy. and nope i dont know how to weld at all. lol…
i think im gonna modify this trailer so i can get the boat sitting alot lower. ill go to bunks then and have it blasted and powdercoated white and put some nice lights and new hardware throughout.
thanks.
Will it fit down between the fenders like this?
its close but yes it looks like it will fit down in between. close where i would probably want to put some carpet on the backside of the fenders, but i can also move the fenders out an inch if needed, theres plenty of room. i would like to get it to sit down a good foot lower though so i need to make all kinds of changes. it has separate “axles” for each side that the hubs ride on instead of having one solid axle so that would help.