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Boat cover

PostPosted: Sun Oct 01, 2017 6:10 pm
by sean
Hey all,
I have been using the cover below for a couple years now, and thought I'd share about it as it seems to be a good long-term option as folks may be thinking about covering their Pocketship for the winter. Certainly more expensive that the various poly tarps I have tried over the years, which all seem to start disintegrating in less than a year, shedding plastic hairs everywhere. We'll see if it lasts beyond its 5 year warranty, but so good so far. Runs about $170, so while not cheap, must less than a custom cover.

http://www.vortexdirect.com/vortex-all- ... y1420.html

Re: Boat cover

PostPosted: Sun Oct 01, 2017 8:59 pm
by mark48
Great find. Please give us seasonal updates.

All the best,
Mark

Re: Boat cover

PostPosted: Sun Nov 08, 2020 7:34 pm
by sean
Hi everyone,
With winter almost upon us, wanted to send out an update on my boat cover after 3 years. While it had no major structural breakdown, the anti-fungal coating did seem to wear off as mold was allowed to grow in several areas. With the cold MN winters and humid summers, you may have better longevity of the cover than I had. However, dispute this disappointment, the customer service has been outstanding. They sent out a new one, which shows they back up their 5-year warranty. With the size in the link above out of stock they sent me a similar sized boat cover that doesn't fit as well - so I would still recommend the flat 14x20 ft cover.

To fully cover the mast and better fit the back of the boat (instead of the extra cover over the top of the mast in the photo above), I hand stitched the back seam most of the way down with Teflon thread. This held up to frequent high winds and kept the rain and snow out.

Re: Boat cover

PostPosted: Mon Nov 09, 2020 2:32 pm
by Mflyer65
Hi Sean,
Thanks for the info on the tarp. I was about to order material to make my own cover but saw this posting and thought I would check it out.
I could not get anyone to answer the phone at the Vortex Direct location but did find various sizes from them on Amazon. I ended up getting a 14x28 Vortex 5yr warranty tarp for $150. Not a bad deal for marine tarp material. Certainly cheaper than what I was about to spend on material and I can just modify this tarp to fit as I need.
Thanks again,
Mike

Re: Boat cover

PostPosted: Tue Nov 10, 2020 11:07 pm
by JonLee
I started out with a similar boat cover, but after the first several continuously damp Northwest winters (and springs, summers, and falls) I ended up getting a custom sunbrella cover made at a local canvas shop. Much more pricey (~10x), but I found it to be more than worth it. Pretty easy to fit into place, with no wrestling with how to tie it down, and no risk of water puddling in creases. With the old cover I had to do pretty intensive upkeep on the spars and rubrails...it just wouldn't keep the rain out and would tend to abrade the varnish/epoxy whenever the wind blew. The custom cover fits snugly (no flogging in the wind, and has generous pads to protect against chafing at all the wear points.

This isn't to recommend this course to everyone, but just to share that I found a solution that worked well for me too..