Davits...Finally!

This post is to summarize the journey to finally have davits installed and operational on Sandrobber. We spent a considerable amount of time researching this addition to our boat, as it was something that would be a "permanent" installation...and once they were installed, we knew that this decision was not reversible.

First off...really quickly...some of you might ask "What's a davit anyway?". Simply put, a set of davits is the mechanism that we employ to attach our dinghy and motor to the mother ship. For dog management, as well as fully being able to enjoy our cruising experience, we have known that a dinghy was something that we wanted to be able to have with us everywhere that we travel. It allows us to "walk the dogs" during our travels, without needing to pull into a marina every 4-5 hours for this reason alone. And then wherever we decide to anchor out for the night, the dinghy expands our ability to explore places that we can't go in the boat.

There were really 4 options for what we could do with the dinghy:

1. Just tow it behind the boat and be done with it. This really wasn't a long-term solution for us. There were safety concerns with this, and also towing a dinghy really makes going through locks very difficult at times.
2. Install a crane on the upper deck and store the dinghy up there on a set of chocks. This was not only quite expensive, but for our purposes, this was not a good solution. We didn't really want to add weight and sail area up top, and given the space available, we didn't like this direction.
3. Use some tip-up style davits. One side of the dinghy would be attached to the back of the swim platform at the water level, and then the dinghy would have to be rotated up, until it was stowed on it's side in the vertical position. We know some other tug owners who have successfully performed this installation, but we still had some concerns about the stress that this would put on the swim platform.
4. Install traditional style davits that anchor to both the swim platform and the transom, and allow for the dinghy to be hung from the back of the boat in a horizontal position.

We chose #4, and settled on davits manufactured by St. Croix. And here is what the final installation looks like:

And here is what it looks like when we add the dinghy:

 So basically, we pull the dinghy up along side the back of the swim platform, attach the dinghy to the davits using the lift rings that are built into the dinghy, and then simply use the block and tackle mechanisms to lift the dinghy into it's stowed position. We will have a couple of other straps to secure that aren't shown, which keep it from swinging around while underway. But the bottom line is that this installation was exactly what we expected, and we feel secure knowing that we have a great permanent solution.

And these also rotate out of the way when the dinghy is in the water. We were concerned that we would lose full use of the swim platform as a result of adding davits, but this solution has proved to be not very intrusive at all. It has added only a very minor inconvenience, and we are not at all concerned about any access or use issues.

For those of you with an interest...here are a few close-ups of the brackets themselves:

The handles that were installed at the top of the transom, to anchor the top of the davits, are through-bolted through the transom and extremely secure. The plates at the bottom of the davits are bolted through the swim platform, plus we added some substantial backing plates (of aluminum) to the underneath side of the platform for stability and to spread the stress out a bit. Here is a pic of the backing plate underneath the swim platform...it is roughly 12"x18":

So that's the end of the story with our davits...probably more than anyone really wanted to know!