Removing Centerboard in Winter
 

Anyone have suggestions on how to remove the centerboard when it is too cold to jump in the water? Besides the obvious solution, a lift.

The cable is broken and my worry is that when I back it off the trailer the centerboard won't have enough room to drop and will dig in at the bottom of the ramp. I can pull the pivot pin but then that just means it will drop into the water making for a wet retrieval.

The board is NOT buoyant, is it? I think it weighs about 70 pounds, is that right? If it is 70 lbs, that makes it kind of hard to just drill a small hole and attach a line to it that I can then pull it to shore with.

Just curious if anyone has suggestions. I will check on prices for a lift but figured I'd check to see if anyone had a better idea.

Re: Removing Centerboard in Winter
 

You can, sometimes, run a line under the boat from side to side and work from the bow back to lift it up (cradle the board).
A 3 inch strap works better than a line (wider to grip the board).

I've done this with the 500 pound board on a Hunter 216, a 70 pound board should be a piece of cake.

Once the board is up, put a line on it so it won't drop when you launch. Then wait til spring.

Re: Removing Centerboard in Winter
 

I did a similar thing with mine. The cable was not working properly after it was on the hard for painting so I put a strap around it before tossing the boat on the trailer. Worked fine

Re: Removing Centerboard in Winter
 

when i pulled my board off in the water it did not just drop out i had to really work to get it out of there , what you have to worry about is if your boat does not get over the keel board on the trailer and the board its jammed in the trailer frame like mine could not get it to go either way ,stuck on the ramp end up dragging it out of the water and cutting the damaged section off .
have been sailing without it since.
i think mine weighed about 50 lbs , i tied arope around several times and tied the rope to the trailer so i could not lose it when it came off .

Re: Removing Centerboard in Winter
 

I sailed for an entire season without a centerboard at all and did not even notice

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