Top 5 reasons to dock bow in (for us)

[syjos]

I am so sorry. I hope you were able to boat together for a long time and have plenty of good boating memories.

From another Sandpiper

 

[Nomad Willy]

I’ve been backing in for some time now to reduce cap rail varnish sun damage.

Because of the shape of bow and stern the overhead roof gives over twice as much protection from UV damage while backed in. The bow is starting to show sun damage so I’ll go bow in for some time now.

Been a nice ride Walt.
I’ll probably sell soon too.

 

[BandB]

Holy crow, who walked the docks for all that data? LOL

Google did.

 

[BandB]

Sounds like a Google maps satellite view analysis.

Ted

Yes, not about to go count in person. I knew some but not others and I loved to find the one exception, the bow in sailboat in a marina where all others were stern in.

 

[markpierce]

Just as a survey of local marinas:

Bahia Mar: 100% stern in.
Hall of Fame: One side is 50/50, the other side 100% stern in.
Las Olas: 70% in favor of stern in.
Coral Ridge: 80% bow in.
Pier 66: 95% stern in.
Harbourtowne: 100% stern in.
Royale Palm: 95% stern in.
Banyan Bay: 95% stern in.
Nautical Ventures: 99% stern in. One sailboat bow in and covered in canvas.
LMC: 100% stern in.
Marina Bay: 98% stern in on regular docks, but they have some side tie docks with two boats on each side and those are 80% bow in.

Nothing that says right or wrong, but most marinas appear to have a customary method and here the majority are stern in.

Is it mostly a function of marina construct or just following the crowd?

 

[KnotYet]

Is it mostly a function of marina construct or just following the crowd?

Always having had a sailboat, bow toward the prevailing wind direction worked best.
It made it nicer leaving the slip or dock when side-tied, raising the sails in the slip, etc.

 

[BandB]

Is it mostly a function of marina construct or just following the crowd?

I think it's a bit of both, initially marina design and then just became the norm.

One thing the question made me go back to was the lake I lived on until 2012. All marinas were bow in. The majority of slips were shaped for it when I was young. They had angled pieces in each of the forward corners of the slip. They were designed for the shape of bows. Now on the coast, slips are rectangles without that.

Finger piers here are just generally not the full length of the boats. I just looked down some slips at Bahia Mar. Slightly more than 50% of all boats extended beyond the finger pier. Most, not very far, but enough that if they were bow in you'd likely see a lot of bows over the dock and many would have difficult times boarding.

I suspect part of it may also be the gradual increase in boat sizes.

 

[Pmcsurf1]

Finger piers here are just generally not the full length of the boats. I just looked down some slips at Bahia Mar. Slightly more than 50% of all boats extended beyond the finger pier. Most, not very far, but enough that if they were bow in you'd likely see a lot of bows over the dock and many would have difficult times boarding.

I suspect part of it may also be the gradual increase in boat sizes.

Good point. We like to bow in because of towing a dink but we're only 40 feet. We'd have a difficult time if the dock was too short. Guess we'd have to use dock steps or find another spot for our dink.

 

[KellyK]

Nailed it!!

 

[ghostrider454]

Two one gallon buckets, one on the bridge and second down in engineering.