i love the EUROTRAX advertisement at the top of the page. all this part and piecing together of nonrelated items (fenders, pvc, abs, bungee, beer) makes me laugh. it reminds me of that tv show JUNK WARS but with junk you have to buy! i saw on the boaters world page fenders for $10. so i quess 4 fenders, 2 lengths of pipe and bungee to make 2 q-tip (registered trade mark) rollers will be around $60.

windbtch,
We would all do well to avoid disparaging advertisers who support our communications infrastructure, even as we come up with more creative and economical ways to do things.

First of all, I am certain that the beach wheels offered by the sponsor are far superior in performance and ease of use than a Qtip style roller for the usual trailer to beach and beach to trailer use.

For coastal cruising, I use qtip style and they are a great thing to have along when you can't find a perfectly shaped log.

To answer the question about how well they stay aligned: The boat is rolling on a pair of inflated fenders. The fenders work well in maintaining floatation in wet sand, dry sand, and silt. The pipe in the middle is simply there to maintain the proper width spacing (via compression) and to give you a way to grab both rollers at once without having to pick up each of the two rollers. The bungie maintains the proper width via tension.

With good bungie tension, they work quite well and don't go askew very badly.

By the way, the Polyethylene 3" pipe runs about $3 / 10 feet.

GARY

At my sailing we have a pebble beach and we all use plastic rain guttering tied to the bottom of the hulls. The boats are then just dragged around. It works brilliantly on pebbles and wet sand, not so sure about deep dry sand, may get a bit bogged down.

Gareth

Hello All

I thought that a post from us at Playaboule may be of value considering our product the EuroTrax was brought up in this thread.

There seems to be some backlash about advertisers, their products which are considered overpriced and the need to find a cheaper alternative.

(1) Have you considered that it is our advertising that keeps "Free" forums like this and web sites like Catsailor alive.
(2) The company Playaboule is NOT "big business". We give back to the sport. We sponsored the recent Tybee 500 by giving away several sets of EuroTrax, some auctioned off to help defray costs for the event. We have paid for advertising in several Hobie division regatta handbooks, to help defray their costs for printing and postage. We have given away several sets of wheels to Cat teams etc. etc.
(3) The cost for this same set of wheels in Europe is $585-00. We sell them in the USA for $399 and have an offer right now with free shipping.

Of course a user can always kluge together a cheap solution from plastic pipe and so on. If damaged hulls, slipped disks, bruised egos etc but having the satisfaction of doing it yourself are important, then maybe the next step is to buy a sewing machine and make your own sails.

Our product breaks down too 2 4 foot lengths of aluminum tube, the wheels slide off and the cradles reposition in seconds. We even supply the allen key for the adjustment assembly. So if size is an issue for the coastal cruiser then we have that covered as well.

Regards
Bede Kortegast
Playaboule

P.S. Try going to your PVC pipe company or fender supplier to get them to sponsor your next regatta handbook. I wonder what their response will be??

try some fenders like the ones monohulls use......easy to use and soft on the hulls