Re: [Paddlewise] kayak storage challenge

I store my 90 pound Current Designs Libra by hanging it from the rafters
of my garage.  I can just haul it off the car or drop it on by myself,
and weigh 135.

I use a Z-drag rather than block and tackle, because I'm cheap.  I have
a large eye bolt screwed into the rafters so the boat is supported about
four feet in from the bow and four from the stern.  A rope with a large
loop to go around the hull is threaded through each eye and through
another eye bolted in a rafter so that the eye is about 6 inches from
the garage wall. This eye directs the rope straight down to where I haul
on it. Then the rope goes through another eye about two and half feet
off the floor in a wall joist.  The rope then goes back up through a
carabiner in a loop tied in the rope in such a way that the boat will be
on my roof rack when this carabiner hits the eye as the rope is
lengthened.  This is the "Z" attachment.  The rope finally goes, when
the boat is hauled up, through a jam cleat mounted to the wall stud to
hold the boat up when stored.

Total cost was not much: two lengths of climbing rope, each about twenty
feet long, six eye bolts, two jam cleats, four carabiners (two of which
fasten the loops around the boats) and some free garden hose pieces that
cushion the loops.

This is hard to describe verbally, but quite simple in practice.  I've
been using this system for almost ten years without any problems.  I
have three other boats hung from the rafters (and two whitewater boats
on the walls), but none are heavy enough to require Z-drags.  The double
is seven meters long, so it hangs diagonally in the two-car [six kayak]
garage.

Hope this helps.

Jim Tibensky
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