Pontoon Boat & Deck Boat Forum

Guess I shouldn't travel to the north for boating, never heard the term "powerloading" we just call it driving onto the trailer, been the only way I've ever loaded my boats in 40 years of boating. Not sure how my prop wash can damage concrete, and my "prop wash" is traveling aft of the ramp area where no trailer should be unless someone drives it completely off the end of the ramp, then its a bad situation in any case. Must be a northern thing.

Inturdasting.....i always drive up and off my trailer, otherwise you are floating in limbo.

I saw a small boat, maybe 16 ft searay bowrider type, do the whole summerged trailer thing and when they pulled out ass end of boat swayed and it got messy quike. They saved it with help,no damage...but not pretty

Prop wash doesn't hurt concrete but gravel, sand, whatever at end of the ramp. When Tenkiller was 20' down the ramp ends had holes and gravel mounds made by prop wash.

lakerunner wrote: ↑

Fri May 25, 2018 3:05 pm

Prop wash doesn't hurt concrete but gravel, sand, whatever at end of the ramp. When Tenkiller was 20' down the ramp ends had holes and gravel mounds made by prop wash.

Yep. It washes out the bottom material from underneath the end of the ramp, leads to a lot of ramp damage over time.

FLOUNDERPOUNDER225 wrote: ↑

Thu May 24, 2018 9:24 am

Guess I shouldn't travel to the north for boating, never heard the term "powerloading" we just call it driving onto the trailer, been the only way I've ever loaded my boats in 40 years of boating. Not sure how my prop wash can damage concrete, and my "prop wash" is traveling aft of the ramp area where no trailer should be unless someone drives it completely off the end of the ramp, then its a bad situation in any case. Must be a northern thing.

Just about every ramp in Minnesota is either dirt or what I call "concrete link" which is roughly 8"x8" x 12'-20' foot wide concrete "logs" linked together with metal rings so there is a few inches of dirt between each log. Both types of landings are damaged easy by power loading. I've damaged a few props by backing into a mount of dirt a good 50+ feet behind were my pontoon floated free from the trailer, its to the point that if the water isn't clear enough to see I use a pole to push my pontoon away from the landing before even attempting to start the motor! Helped an older couple a few years ago get their pontoon trailer out of the lake because the 28' bunk trailer dropped the axles off the end of the Concrete link and the tires wouldn't pop back up, had to dive down and attach a pair of ratchet straps to the front of my pontoon to his trailer and lift it a foot or so it could get back up on the ramp. NOT a fun thing to do at a busy ramp with people lined up to use the ONE ramp......... and I seemed to be the only one willing to help the couple out!

Never knew such a thing, but I grew up in FL boating in the Gulf and Atlantic, sounds like they could do a better job of ramp construction actually, now falling off the end, I've seen that.. actually saw a guy strip the running gear off the trailer, he hit so hard trying to get the tires back up on the ramp, the repeated impact tore the leafs and axle right off the trailer. now you have some serious problems LOL!

When they dropped our lake a couple of years ago, I was amazed that the damage at the end of the ramp. Here is a pretty good article (with graphic)....

https://marineboard.wordpress.com/2015/ ... -practice/