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...............................................--- Zodiac Carrying Box ---
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Our Zodiac 285 Zoom is about 80 lbs. for the bare boat, but the floor oars and seat bring it to a little over 100 lbs. Too much for us mid 60's people to lift at once. I designed a box to hold the boat and gear in a way that we could load the box in the jeep, then load the boat (yellow plastic bag) into the box followed by the rest of the boat. To do this I wanted a box that was open on the front, so the front slides down into place and then the top closes and locks it into place.
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Here I'm a ways along on the construction. I used 3/8's inch exterior plywood and 1 X 2 furring strips. I use them to make a lot of stuff.
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The arrows point to the slot that the front will slide down into. I'm using the plywood in my hand to test the slot.
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The arrows point to one of the legs of my 2 post car lift. I love it for working on stuff like this. I rotate the arms out and put a piece of plywood on them for a table and raise it to a comfortable working height. The box at this point has the lid finished and about two thirds of the way up on the inside is a slotted area for the top shelf. The boat goes on the bottom and the rest of the junk on the top shelf.
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Here is the shelf for the rest of the junk.......and......
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........... the front that slides down into place being slid down.......
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........ into place............. and .................
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............. Ready for paint.
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After giving it a couple coats of paint it was ready to try out. Here the boat proper has been slid into place.
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Next the shelf is put into place.....
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......... for the slated floor, oars and seat.
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Ready to go, but too heavy for us to carry. To move it you take the stuff out and then carry the box to the Jeep or Storage. Next you carry the boat to it and slide it in and then slide in the top shelf with the other stuff. This way you don't have to lift the whole works at once.
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There are rope handles on the end. Actually I can carry the case loaded with another guy. Ruth isn't strong enough and this design does make it easier to carry the components separately. The main reason for the case though is to be able to carry the Zodiac in the Jeep out of the weather and have it secure from theft, hopefully.
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I made this frame work to hold the box. The two center arrows point to two upright assemblies that the box sits on. The top and bottom arrows point to two boards with tabs on them that locate the uprights and keep them from falling over. The far right arrow points to a slot (there is another one on the other side) that the back board slides down into. All of these pieces fit together without being fastened to one another. This makes it possible to put these 4 pieces in place in a matter of seconds as they all fit together like an interlocking puzzle.
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To load the box you slide the back board up and out. The you slide the box in with the front off. Next you load the boat into the bottom of the box and then put in the top shelf and close the box back up.
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Then you slide that back board back down into place.
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There is locked storage under the box. A single chain and a couple locks locks the swing tire carrier, the box and the outboard for some security.
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I can still get into the box that is in the front of the jeep bed. This is a CJ-8 Scrambler with the longer wheelbase.
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I made this mount on the side for the 5 HP Tohatsu. It is nice when you have an older vehicle that you plan on keeping for ever and don't mind drilling holes in it.
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Here the support system has.......
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..........been painted. On the far side you can see the piece of wood that is on the inside of the bed for the outboard motor mount. The bed skin is sandwiched between the mount on the outside and this board on the inside.
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A picture from the outboard motor mount side.....and....
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............ here are the pieces out of the Jeep. Since they aren't fastened to each other they lay flat and are easy to store.
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Here we are on the way to the local lake before the box supports were painted.