Rick, Although my boat is a 17, I was faced with adding keel rollers, not to replace a board, but to replace a single roller that was over loaded. My trailrite trailer originally had but one, just aft of the first cross-channel, and it was severely over loaded.
When I bought the boat, I saw that the rubber roller was split and the shaft was bent, so I merely replaced them. Shortly after, the new roller was in the same sorry condition. So.... I made up a frame upon which four rollers were mounted, two aft of the c/b, one under the c/b about 3/4" lower, the amount the c/b protrudes, and one fwd of the c/b. The frame height w/ respect to the bunks is adjustable with shims. I have it set up so that the bulk of the weight rests on the rollers. I also added keel guides to help get the boat centered on the trailer. Since these mods, no more bent rollers and getting the boat on the trailer is much easier. Photo at: http://www.todspages.net/images/BBd01a-TrailerKeelGuides.jpg Lastly, I noticed that some gelcoat on the corner of a strake on each side was taking a bit of a beating thanks to years of too concentrated of a load, so I slipped 1/2" closed-cell foam pads between the bunk carpeting and the wooden bunk board. Tod M17 #408 BuscaBrisas -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Rick Langer Sent: Wednesday, April 06, 2005 9:39 AM To: [email protected] Subject: M_Boats: Trailer Keel Rollers I need advice on keel rollers. My trailer has a 2x8 attached to the frame sections which the keel sets on. I'm thinking that rollers would make retrival easier. If I mount the rollers on the cross frames they will end up being about 3" aft of the front of the keel and about 4" forward of the aft end of the keel. This seems a little too close to the ends of the keel for comfort. Where is the best place to support the keel? What size rollers should I use? How much of the boats weight should bear on the rollers and how much on the bunks that support the hull? Thanks, Rick Langer M15 #337 _______________________________________________ http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/montgomery_boats _______________________________________________ http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/montgomery_boats
