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We recently had the opportunity to build a custom bow rail for Whaler Central member Gregg D'ippolito. This rail is identical in size to the OEM rail but mounts entirely on top of the deck. Thank you very much Gregg!
Your work looks very nice and the boat is beautiful, but as the owner of one of those boats, I have always understood the real structural strength of the tall bow rail to be in the two point attachment design. All of Whaler's taller bow rails, and side rails, both on the 16'17' hull and the early Outrages, had the side stantions supported at two places for increased safety of failure when loaded under severe conditions at sea. I have never thought the thin top skin was intended for structural attachments other than light duty applications, which is why they took the stantion bases down to the monolithic hull casting.
Finnegan wrote:
Your work looks very nice and the boat is beautiful, but as the owner of one of those boats, I have always understood the real structural strength of the tall bow rail to be in the two point attachment design. All of Whaler's taller bow rails, and side rails, both on the 16'17' hull and the early Outrages, had the side stantions supported at two places for increased safety of failure when loaded under severe conditions at sea. I have never thought the thin top skin was intended for structural attachments other than light duty applications, which is why they took the stantion bases down to the monolithic hull casting.
It is my experience that none of Boston Whaler's early tall bow rails and side rails are capable of withstanding any significant force, despite being secured at two points. or a monolithic hull. The problem with these original rails is the wall thickness of the tubing. Why Boston Whaler chose to use .049 wall tubing is beyond me. It really has no place on a boat, especially in critical structural products such as bow rails, side rails, and console rails. Most of the early OEM rails I come across are kinked right at the site of the side support or in the case of the early Outrages, where the tubing comes through the gunwale. Nobody uses thin walled .049 tubing today. I believe Boston Whaler stopped in the early 90's. I wouldn't even use .049 material for a bimini top because you can easily bend it by hand.
My rails feature .065 wall tubing which is significantly stronger than Whaler's OEM rail. It does attach on top of the bow deck at all attachment points. If this deck can be stood on, it can easily support the bow rail. In fact, the OEM rail is attached to the top deck at the very front with the use of wood backing supports underneath. My rail was designed and built so that the bases would mount right next to the drip edge on the front deck. The profile of this drip edge makes for a strong connection point. And, Gregg did install wood backing plates at all attachment points. I have no doubt this rail will withstand any severe conditions Gregg encounters at sea. Hopefully, he will chime in here with a review after a few sea trials.
A most interesting subject.
I for one have a classic that never was equipped with a bow rail.
Therefore no holes were ever seen for the reception of the classic railing.
I would be intrigued to hear more on the subject.
I have been in and out of the Barneget inlet several times since I installed Raymond Martin's bow rail and have not lost one passenger. I will be honest with you all when that Noreaster comes along I will not put it to that type of test.
All jokes aside this rail suits my needs. Although I can see ones concern in the event of fishing offshore as I do from time to time and the seas become angry. I'm confident it's strong and secure it also looks great too.
I took the family out last weekend to a sand bar to play, they were hanging all over it climbing and pulling on it most of the day. The rail didn't budge.
This was once a coast guard boat and as I learned on this forum was built to workboat specifcations I don't know what type of rail was on it before, there are no signs of any penatrations through the gunnels for the stantions. This hull was stripped down pretty far when it was rescued from being crushed the only thing left on it was the tow bar and the console. The console hand rail if you look at the picture is not your typical rail either but I like it because a passenger can sit in the middle without the hand bar in their back and it is firm. The question I have is was that the work boat console and hand rail?
I did clean up the boat this year after using and abusing it for 10 years. Time and money prevented me from doing a complete restoreation and I was not going give up a fishing season to do that. (work is for people that don't know how to fish) I am very proud to be a Whaler owner and plan on keeping this one till the end. I don't need it to be completely origional the important part is what everyone knows the "Hull". So as I removed all the parts to clean them up and painted the hull. I did try to keep it as origional as my budget and time allowed. The items I was really interested in doing with this project was the rub rail which wasn't that hard to find an origional. The bow rail I had trouble with finding and did not know how it was to be fastened thru the gunnels until Raymond Martin told me. We discussed my needs and he made this one for me. I like it very much and am very pleased with it, and it fit in the budget.
I will recommend to anyone that needs a bow rail to give Raymond Martin a call. He was very helpful in may case. The bow rail is what I needed it added the comfort knowing my passengers were tucked in while on the bow. Ever fish a small channel when a yacht came buy and rocked your world because he owns the water?
The boat is turning heads but I'm still going to get it dirty.
Gregg
Both rail and boat look great. Just one question… Do you think you would gain more room if the rail matched the inner hull as opposed to angling it in?
donp wrote:
Both rail and boat look great. Just one question… Do you think you would gain more room if the rail matched the inner hull as opposed to angling it in?
He would've probably gained a little more room in the corners if I would've matched the round shape of the hull. However, I took a tracing of an original rail and matched the height and shape of the new rail to keep with original look of the boat.
