Davits... do you have them?l

[robbjd]

Our 34Mk II had davits installed by the previous owner. Not sure of the brand, but they're 1.25" tubing and very sturdy. We have a small Walker Bay dinghy with a Honda 2.3 Hp. four stroke outboard which stays on the dinghy when raised on the davits. View astern is restricted , but hasn't been an issue. Mounted on top of the davits is a 235 watt solar panel which supplies all of our 12 & 110 volt needs.

[Bill Shreeves]

I thought long and hard about davits.  Mainly because I wanted an easy means to launch my 91 lb 8' RIB and my 56 LB 4-stroke 6 HP Yamaha, kept on the push pit, without shredding my back someday.  Well, I really don't like the idea of davits on the back of my 34 obstructing my great view so, I decided to try a different approach for a season or two first.

A few weeks ago I installed a Garhauer engine hoist on the push-pit.  I also bought one of their dinghy davit blocks, which are 6-1, plus an additional carabiner clip to use to lift the dinghy off the fore deck each weekend.  I replaced the 60' davit block line with a 150' and bought a $15 canvas bucket from Harbor Freight to keep it all in.  The bucket also works very well to pay the line out from / capture the line in etc. without having to coil it all the time.

So far, it's been great and I'm loving it.  I can easily handle deploying and retrieving the dinghy all by myself on the fore deck after hoisting my spare jib halyard to a pre-marked point without having the admiral up there while I manage the winch.  I make sure I clip the top carabiner clip to the bag handle so its easy to employ and keep the lines from getting tangled.  Also, the engine hoist is awesome and very easy to use.  So, I'm < $700 in and don't have the davits and dinghy obstructing the great view from my cockpit.  Also, the davit block and line is long enough to work for man-overboard retrieval which really appeals to me.

Just thought I'd share my possible alternative.