Another... How the heck do you board this thing?

function seems to be taking a back seat to appearance

Wait till that spring line slacks from a wake and snags in one of those spaces between fiberglass pieces before it goes taught again.$$$

Maybe I'm missing something due to the prospective of those pictures. But can't you just step from the dock to the swim platform? Or is the distance you have to step down to great due to the tide at the time?

The lack of extra cleats and/or proper fair leads is silly. But you could over come that by running your springs forward off your midship cleats.

As to the scuffing, wooly line wraps would help. With designs like that, those should come as standard equipment from the factory.

What about having to duck under that line?

Come on guys. It's a boat. We step across spaces and over lines. A girl in spiked heels and a miniskirt could board that and not even be embarrassed. Only problem I see is that there's no way to run a spring from the aft cleat although I can't see if there's an aft-midship cleat.

I agree with the above and if that stbd side gap is too big for you, you can get your self a wooden board of a suitable size and strength to bridge between the platform and jetty.

Pascal, you are over complicating matters unless you are bored and want to kill time . A piece of carpet below the plank will solve the problem or the Atlantis towels .

Btw., your port side fenders are too high .

A fellow from my marina started making these several years ago (DK if it's still his company and I have no connection). Deck to Dock Inc.
Light and easy to deal with, and of course you don't leave them down when off the boat. Also, if you look at the angle of the boat he has his bow in and stern out. A simple line adjustment would make a world of difference in that pic.

Now if you want something hard to board try an older 56' Hat. It's a 4'-5' drop down to a floating dock until the boarding ladder is put in place. Or 5 steps down the ladder to the swim platform after you get that all opened up. On boats we cope, or we hire crew to help. Although some don't realize it, these are not a BMW or Lexus. Now of course there are some rediculous designs, and we've seen them earlier, but these look like pretty normal boat designs. On a boat there has to be a way for drunks to get wet and make fools of themselves. The rest of us can easily step across a couple foot gap. Hell, I still remember laying a ladder across from the ice coated wheelhouse roof to the snow covered shore 18' above the ice filled water and making my way across when I did commercial work. No place for sussies on boats.

Most boats today are built with stern-to docking in mind, or at most a short finger. A break in the rail for when you go side-to a fixed dock would be nice, and could be added easily enough if that's your normal situation. For sales purposes though they want to maintain a clean line and a lower price point. On the Hat side docking is almost a must, and that's very limiting. On the Hat we have (3) alternatives for boarding (ladder, sea-step or fold up steps) all heavy and all requiring you to first get down onto the dock. This has kept me off the boat since my accident. The boat pictured I could roll onto with my push scooter.

We must be looking at different marinas. Most of the marinas I've been in have no fingers at all and those that do may have one about 10' to 20' long. Most only have a few full side boarding slips. So they are building to the circumstances. Oddly, one pf the best boarding systems I ever encountered was a cockpit Carver. Boarding from the stern was a cinch with a nice walk-through to an ample platform, and if you were docking side-to they had steps leading up from the cockpit to the side deck that put you on a dock about 8' from the stern. I'm not a lover of Carvers, but their designer let form follow functionthere. One of the worst is also a Carver, the 42 Woody Woodpecker with the transom coming out to a point in the middle of the swim platform. Looks pretty though. Most today are designed to look sleek and sexy. Function is barely an after-though. I agree with you that curving a swimplatform in away from the dock makes no sense, but it looks pretty and is forgiving for those who can't back up straight into a slip. And that's what sells when you're selling to non-boaters.

The marinas on the West Coast I am familiar had floating docks which meant that the stern was basically the same height as the docks. This made it fairly easy to board from the stern. On other boats you could have a three or four step boarding system to board from the side. As I remember we had a three step boarding system for our sailboat. As long as it was portable the marinas let us use them. You could make one for about $100 or so.

The side boarding ladder and gate is usually an option and if specified prior to the build of the boat it will be incorporated in the boat. I know it's being done one some Fairline models, but the customer must remember to ask for it before building the boat.

Many boat dealers or sales persons and lots of new boat owners are not aware of some essential details when specifying a new boat. The owner will probably get it right when buying his second boat and avoiding most mistakes he had with his first boat.