launching a large boat with a tractor?

[Refueler]

McGregors are the work of Satan, and utterly and completely unsuited to the sailing environment up there! Your other suggestions, why not. A fair number of similar designs exist.

I did say "I loathe to" ......

Had occasion to ask one to tow my boat when engine failed ... thinking a 50hp on back end of the McG would be fine ..... No way Hose ! He just slid about side to side .... as the boat had no 'grip' at all in the water. I was only just aground - he gave up ... I transferred my 'crew' to his boat and stayed with mine. Once he was clear - a combo of anchor and genny - I had her off the mud and worked way up HYCo channel to the pontoon ....

I was gobsmacked by the lack of capability of the McG ...

 

[Farmer Piles]

Keep your main boat in Wick, buy your tractor for tending your land and keep a handy runabout - like an Orkney Strikeliner - to lauch quickly and easily to get out on the water on the balmy days.

 

[ylop]

Tractors ? They used to have a 5mile allowance for travel from field to field .. and TBH - Police had no interest in Tractors unless unsafe operation. Long time since I drove Tractors in UK ... so maybe that's no longer ??

If the guy has slip and field close to each other - surely none of those issues apply ?

Where he is police are probably pretty relaxed, right up until the moment something goes wrong - like the trailer losing a wheel and blocking the tourist road for 3 hrs and a massive queue, or a driver not used to single track roads and left hand drive gets something wrong, or he passes a cyclist who thinks "this can't be legal" and kicks off a twitter war.

Easier to ask for forgiveness than permission sometimes. Besides, nobody but a traffic officer would actually know. Round here, you see all sorts of technically illegal boat movements, the local boatyard occasionally take their giant boat forklift on the road to the harbour crane. Nobody cares in small habour/fishing communities. And God be praised for that.

Potentially some of the local farmers / fishermen know because they've been made to comply with pesky rules and will take umbridge at an income ignoring them. Of course they may also be bending many of those rules, but its remarkably easy to upset someone who will have the ear of someone with influence at the pub/church/shinty club/etc. If it were just twice a year what you get away with may be different from every weekend in summer.

As for the tractor, my only concern is the slip is very steep and not in excellent condition, however there are some large fishing boats that they seem to take in and out.

who owns the slip? where do the boats go when out the water?

I daresay the nearest BMW is about 50 miles on average. This isn’t Essex. However, I do understand the point you are making. I feel the risk is small, at under 20mph in a fairly remote area. People in such places are used to large farm machinery, and even less predictable loads.

Plenty of tourists in that part of the world in the months he's likely to move the boat.

If you pay dues in a harbour you have as much right to stay as any other vessel; given your location the harbour authority will likely be Highland Council.

Commercial vessels may be paying a different rate and get different priorities. But even assuming that is not the case the reality of who is technically right 'v' who you cooperate/bow down to in a small rural community may not be the same thing. Piss off the fisherman and there may be no help when you get the trailer stuck somewhere. Befriend them and you might find they offer their tractor for the job.

The reason I thought this may be a goer is that they haul fishing boats of the same size are larger out of the water regularly. As soon as the weather looks like it may be getting rough, they take them in and out like a yoyo. Therefore I gather it must be possible.

Problem I can see is if the weather has been bad and now is looking good for sailing and they want to launch you'll be in the way, and vice versa when you've been out sailing and the gale warning gets broadcast you are trying to recover and they turn up to move their boats. Those sort of things can all be easily sorted with a bit of polite conversation, forward planning, bottles of whisky, buying fish from them throughout the year etc. But it is far easier to damage those relationships than build them - so I'd be asking their advice, not outs.

 

[penfold]

Commercial vessels may be paying a different rate and get different priorities. But even assuming that is not the case the reality of who is technically right 'v' who you cooperate/bow down to in a small rural community may not be the same thing. Piss off the fisherman and there may be no help when you get the trailer stuck somewhere. Befriend them and you might find they offer their tractor for the job.

That is as maybe, but without knowing which harbour all anyone can offer is a very general suggestion based on conjecture; some are congested and busy, some are not.

 

[Davy_S]

As an ex Vega owner, (great boat for sailing) i can honestly say, forget any thoughts of trailer sailing it! you could get away with a once a year launch and recovery if you had a mooring, otherwise heed the advice given and go for something smaller or bilge keeled, good luck anyway.

 

[Chiara’s slave]

I did say "I loathe to" ......

Had occasion to ask one to tow my boat when engine failed ... thinking a 50hp on back end of the McG would be fine ..... No way Hose ! He just slid about side to side .... as the boat had no 'grip' at all in the water. I was only just aground - he gave up ... I transferred my 'crew' to his boat and stayed with mine. Once he was clear - a combo of anchor and genny - I had her off the mud and worked way up HYCo channel to the pontoon ....

I was gobsmacked by the lack of capability of the McG ...

I did sense that you were being polite to any Maccy G owners out there. A number of things about them leave me gobsmacked, in a truly Shakespearian way. How do I hate them, let me count the ways….

 

[Refueler]

I did sense that you were being polite to any Maccy G owners out there. A number of things about them leave me gobsmacked, in a truly Shakespearian way. How do I hate them, let me count the ways….

In a short time period we had an American Boat Design invasion .... people looked at what they offered 'in-cabin' and convenience ... but soon found out a boat built for US Intra-Costals was NOT built for UK waters ...

Friend of mine (ex Moody owner) decided to get another boat. I directed him to a really nice kitted out Jeanneau 36 ... he even got a really good price agreed on it ... it was pristine and loaded with all ever needed - even good radar.
Next I heard he'd paid a lot more for a ****** 36 out of Portland. Not only the purchase price - but then he had the costs of the gear to kit it out to real cruising level. I warned him that soon he will start to see the poor design ...
Less than 2 yrs - cockpit locker tops warped and not c losing properly ... water system leaked ... lack of backstays were showing signs of stress .... he put it on market ..... took him over 2 years to get rid of it ....

I am sure many can recognise the Boat brand ....

His Wife LOVED the interior ... but what a dog.

 

[rgarside]

Just on the subject of pulling boats up ramps with tractors:-
Find the slope of the ramp and do the sums to find what traction you need allowing for at least 10% friction, and being generous with the weight of stuff you have on board in addition to the brochure weight of the boat. Then find the weight of your tractor, and apply a coefficient of friction of around 50% to find out when the tyres are likely to slip on a wet, possibly weedy ramp. Allow a generous margin to decide whether your tractor can safely pull your boat up the ramp. The tractor power will usually be adequate, as it will generally have sufficiently low gears.

 

[Refueler]

Just on the subject of pulling boats up ramps with tractors:-
Find the slope of the ramp and do the sums to find what traction you need allowing for at least 10% friction, and being generous with the weight of stuff you have on board in addition to the brochure weight of the boat. Then find the weight of your tractor, and apply a coefficient of friction of around 50% to find out when the tyres are likely to slip on a wet, possibly weedy ramp. Allow a generous margin to decide whether your tractor can safely pull your boat up the ramp. The tractor power will usually be adequate, as it will generally have sufficiently low gears.

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[Farmer Piles]

Just on the subject of pulling boats up ramps with tractors:-
Find the slope of the ramp and do the sums to find what traction you need allowing for at least 10% friction, and being generous with the weight of stuff you have on board in addition to the brochure weight of the boat. Then find the weight of your tractor, and apply a coefficient of friction of around 50% to find out when the tyres are likely to slip on a wet, possibly weedy ramp. Allow a generous margin to decide whether your tractor can safely pull your boat up the ramp. The tractor power will usually be adequate, as it will generally have sufficiently low gears.

As yousay, the power is unlikely to be the issue as they have massive torque reserves too. Grip on the slipway is a big factor. But as the OP has said, the local fishermen use tractors for this job.
I still think that to keep the job simple is the way to go. The simpler your hobby is the more likely you are to do it and enjoy it.

 

[penfold]

I did say "I loathe to" ......

Had occasion to ask one to tow my boat when engine failed ... thinking a 50hp on back end of the McG would be fine ..... No way Hose ! He just slid about side to side .... as the boat had no 'grip' at all in the water. I was only just aground - he gave up ... I transferred my 'crew' to his boat and stayed with mine. Once he was clear - a combo of anchor and genny - I had her off the mud and worked way up HYCo channel to the pontoon ....

I was gobsmacked by the lack of capability of the McG ...

That's operator error; had they dropped the keel halfway it would have stood a chance of achieving something.

 

[penberth3]

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There' always one!!!!!!!!

 

[KeithMD]

I don't think horsepower will be a concern. Even a small tractor has enough very low range gears to pull a considerable load even if the engine is not very powerful.
He does not need to reach 50mph up a 10% incline.

Agreed, it's not like Clarkson's Farm and he needs a 300hp Lambourghini tractor.

 

[rgarside]

There' always one!!!!!!!!

Actually looks as though there are two!

 

[rotrax]

Launching from the natural beach is very common here in NZ.

My mate Spencer has a Batch - beach house - in Waimarama. Loads of sport fishing boats launch there using tractors of all types, directly into the surf.

For anything with sails larger than 24 foot I would think it is not worth the candle.

We visited the Mahia Peninsula some years ago. Out halfway into the shallow bay were four posts with a bench and box built across the front two posts.

Two days later a large Cray boat went between the four posts. A crew member got out, fired up the engine which was in the box, well above the oggin. The others secured the boat as the tide dropped whereupon the whole rig drove across the shallow bay, up the beach, through the streets and into the owners yard.

The box had a big diesel engine and the wheels, like a yard boat lift, were driven by hydraulics.

Clever..................................

 

[tommy2]

If it was just for your 20 acres a 50-60 hp old school Leyland, Case, Ford, MF. Preferrable 4x4, and a front end loader is a massive boon.
For towing your boat you would want at least that size as much as anything to be able to handle the weight on the back. It's one thing to edge around a flat yard at low speed, but quite another to manoeurvre on a slope or a slipway. Tractor tyres are made for gripping in soil not on sloping slippery concrete so a bit of size and weight would be a benefit. Four wheel drive comes to the fore then too.

***CASE IH 1594 COMMEMORATIVE EDITION 4WD TRACTOR*** | eBay

FORD 5610 4WD Y REG V5 GOOD TINWORK NO ROT SLIGHTLY USED FRONT TYRES BUBBLE CAB | eBay

Out of interest why do yo suggest the FORD 5610 over something like the VALMET 8100 shown here:
1995 VALMET 8100 For Sale in Chippenham, England

There is not much difference in price, put the VALMET is a much bigger beast and is 120hp. Is it simply that there are more spare parts / attachment available for the FORD? I suppose my top budget for a tractor would be about 10 thousand pounds or a little over. But very happy to go for something cheaper.

 

[tommy2]

Launching from the natural beach is very common here in NZ.

There is a beach not far away, but I have never seen people launch from there. The surf is normally quite big off this beach.

 

[KREW2]

Topics gone to 4 pages huh. Lot of typing when the answer is simply "NO"

 

[tommy2]

Topics gone to 4 pages huh. Lot of typing when the answer is simply "NO"

Aside from the idea of launching from a slip. People have towed the Albin Vega on a road tailor for considerable distances. I found this on another forum:

“A swiss family has towed their Albin Vega from Switzerland to the French Riviera (>700km) and at the end of their journey back from Venice, Italy to Switzerland again (>600km). They used a Jeep Grand Cherokee”

Here is their website with some pictures
Reise 2007 | aliki

 

[boomerangben]

Just on the subject of pulling boats up ramps with tractors:-
Find the slope of the ramp and do the sums to find what traction you need allowing for at least 10% friction, and being generous with the weight of stuff you have on board in addition to the brochure weight of the boat. Then find the weight of your tractor, and apply a coefficient of friction of around 50% to find out when the tyres are likely to slip on a wet, possibly weedy ramp. Allow a generous margin to decide whether your tractor can safely pull your boat up the ramp. The tractor power will usually be adequate, as it will generally have sufficiently low gears.

I get your love of numbers and desire to engineer a solution, but I’m not sure it’s as simple as you seem to suggest. You need to know torque at the wheels, therefore power at and rpm of wheels. Not sure how easy that is. But the bottom line is a small 35/ 135 tractor which are readily available in the Highlands and Islands would be more than adequate. The challenge will be grip and engineering that will be, well, challenging