Boat Buckle - Z6 Trailer

[john horn]

I got a pair of retractable "Boat Buckles" for X-mas. I went to install them and they will be too high and will hit the boat of boat when launching. How are you guys installling these? Pictures?

 

[Herndonpro]

You may need the mount bracket shown in the link.



HP
http://www.immioutdoors.com/boatbuckle/transom/products_transom_g2.htm

 

[john horn]

That will not help. The Buckle is 5" and installing it to the factory tie down location it is too high.

 

[Jim B]

John,

I had a similar issue with my Z7 trailer. From what everyone says they wont hit but i launch at a lot of ramps that are at very shallow angle. I figured on two ways to solve it. one was to leave them loose enough to rotate out of the way or build a custom bracket to drop them a little. I went with the bracket plan. I had bought the boatbuckle bracket but they didn't work like i wanted so i modified them.



Here is what i did. I flattened out the stock boat buckle piece and i welded on another piece to drop it ~1"

Then i bolted them to the stock strap mounts. I drilled all new holes for the brackets, two per side. When i bolted them on then the buckles to the new mount. here is what they eneded up looking like. They work perfect, they are down just slightly below the bunks now.

 

[Aroldo Hernandez]

Awsome set up jim.

 

[Dan J.]

Unless someone has found a way to launch their boat without the transom coming off the bunks first, the buckles will not touch the hull. I bet we've installed close to a thousand sets in ATL and I have never heard of clearance issues in action. (Just looks funny the first time.) It can only hit if the boat is sliding up the bunks entirely from end to end, which I have never seen for a bass boat hull.

 

[Jim B]

Dan on a very shallow ramp like some of the ones i launch on(if you can even call them ramps)they can and will hit. Mine did for sure the first time i launched at one of my local lakes and i had to beat it back into position with a hammer.

 

[Dan J.]

Jim - That's a great remedy you installed for your buckles. Nice, clean and pretty. A great solution to an uncommon exception. For a buckle problem to exist, the hull's initial contact would have to be so far at the very end of the bunks (almost where the buckles are), powering up until the transom/motor are resting at/on the bunk ends, which would also be pushing against the buckle tops for a good length of the hull while powering up. That would be dang near dry-loading the hull and I can only imagine how much that would suck! :blink: (Low-tide/long ramp situation?) I hate to hear that some of your ramps are like that.



I should clarify by saying that I believe 99% of the ramps used with these buckles should be A-OK.

 

[Jim B]

Dan, we have a lot of "unimproved" ramps in my area that are very shallow angle. It's just one of those is what it is kind of things.



One of my favorite places to fish the ramp is just terrible. Its dirt which is a non issue but the thing is so shallow aqt its deepest spot there isnt enough water at the rear of the boat to even get it floating. If you back in any further it starts going the wrong way.... I literally have to get under the bow and give it a big push to get it to slide off the trailer. It it wasnt for siliconed bunks and my tree trunk like legs it would never come of the trailer there. If the fishing wasnt fantastic there i would never put up with it but the ramp keeps a lot of people off and the fishing is great. This place is one of many that i fish where i would hit the buckles if i bolted them in the regular spot.

 

[Glenn Silva3]

installed mine today thanks to photos from Jim B