Does your boat fit in your garage???? Help - need to buy a house w/in 2 weeks or so.

I just purchased a 2010 Super Air Nautique 210 Team and just sold my house. (to make things crazier - my wife is giving birth to our second son within two weeks!) The boat is at the dealership until we move into the new place and things settle down some. I called the dealership and was told that with the tower folded down, I am facing 8 feet 4 inches from the ground. Now - I am not a construction guy, but I am under the impression that most garage doors are either 7 feet or 8 feet tall.

We are looking for a newer house - either built in the last 10 years or new construction. A house with a three car garage, using the 3rd car as the boat storage... Because of the deals out there, I don't want to build.....am I not going to find a garage door that will fit my boat?

Is the measurement wrong? Can you guys fit your boats into your garage??

Thanks for your help! I am freaking out that the boat won't fit (although - that is pretty far from the top of the list right now - lol)

I've seen some homes with a garage that has 1 bay with a vaulted door, that would be your best bet. Or something with a pull barn near the house.

You might be able to squeak a few inches by dropping the tire pressure, but besides that you would be SOL shy of removing the tower completely.

I doubt there is any extra bunk clearance on the trailer, but if there is you might be able to re-do those and drop the boat a few more inches.

If your a construction guy then just kick up the header and put in a taller door. That's what i'd do if I had the skills that is.

Lol - Razzman - I said I am not a construction guy. I am in the financial biz...... Razzman - I see that you have a Mobius (nice looking boat btw - love the all black hull!) do you garage your boat?

I have to be honest - I almost think that with the technology of the new towers - we are talking about 2010 here, that the tower should be designed to fit under an average 7 or 8 foot garage door.

I am wondering if the dealership made a mistake on the height of the tower?

Ahhh my bad! Thanks, no i keep mine in a structure next to the garage. Mine won't fit under either, it''s about 4" too high with the tower down.

have you tried measuring the height of the boat unhitched and lowered the trailer jack as low as possible? that will save you about 5 inches right there!

I would go measure it myself. Over 8 feet seems pretty big to me, especially on a 21ft boat

My neighbor's '08 210 will not fit in his normal height garage with the tower down. We tried once when a bad storm destroyed his sam's club tent that he used to store it in. Those boats sit very high on the trailer and the towers do not fold very low.

Depending on the age of the door you might be able to buy one more panel for it. This would probably reduce the materials cost significantly vs. buying a new door. What's the interior ceiling height though? If it's only 8' then you're going to have to do some major work to move the header up to be flush with the ceiling and you probably would not be able to have an automatic opener (At least not the traditional style). If it's 9-10' then you'd probably have space to move the header and the opener up higher to clear a taller door.

Alternatively could you modify the tower to somehow fold lower?

One more option might be to sell your current trailer and get one that's designed for low clearance. I think I heard that Malibu offers this as an option so maybe you could get one from one of the various aftermarket trailer manufacturers.

When we bought our new boat, I had to switch towers so that the boat would fit into our shop. The dealer had identical boats with different towers. The dealer brought out the first boat and with the tower folded it was still to tall for the door (not sure on the door height), so they brought out the 2nd boat that had a different tower and it fit. (I told them that I wasn't going to buy the boat until I verified that it fit into our shop.)
Point being, does Nautique have different towers available you might be able to get the dealer swap it to a tower that folds more? And congrats on the new baby!

I suspect that measurement is wrong. I have a 08 210 with a Titan tower and a Boatmate trailer with 18'' wheels. It measures 6'6'' to the top of the windshield and 6'8.5'' with the tower folded.
What tower do you have Fct 1, 2 or 3?

MHunter: I have the FCT 3 tower.

6 feet 8 sounds like a great height - one that I would suspect Nautique's engineers would consider when designing the boat.

The more I think about it, I think it HAS to be in inaccurate measurement.

I might make another post about measuring your Nautique - see if I can get some action.

I advise,

go to the dealership,
fold the tower down,
lay a ~8 foot or so 2x4 across the tower so its end(s) hang over the pavement,
perhaps put level on the 2x4 and true it to horizontal, and
measure with a tape measure.

I've got a 211 with the tower in my profile. I put the tower down every trip ... and store in a boat locker.

It wouldn't fit in my homes arched garage door opening, which is only 7 foot at the center. But I bet it would have fit an 8 foot high opening.

The 8ft+ measurement sounds about right depending on the trailer. The 2010 FCT3 was horrible for fold-down clearance and that is why it was replaced with the ugly version in 2011. They offered the Titan FCT2 that year, which folded much lower (below window).

A 7ft door is standard, but you do see 8ft doors out there. Depending on the construction, raising the beam will not be cheap or easy. There are a few tricks that might give you the 4in that you need or you might need to change out the tower.

I advise you to head over to planetnautique.com and post your question with what tower u have and trailer. Should get a quick precise answer.

I just picked up a 2011 VLX, I have a 7' 4" garage height, and it will not clear the garage without removing the G3 cross member hoop. Its 4 bolts, but still a little of a PIA. I would recommend as others mentioned, measuring first and seeing what your options are. I am about 4" over from clearing.

I would say any garage that is 8' will clear most towers folded down. Your trailer type also plays into it. My '08 Supra fit, and the VLX does not.

Jonathan - great advice. I will try to do that. The dealership is an hour and 30 minutes from me - so I will need to plan a trip. Nice looking boat btw!

My dealership told me yesterday that I can get the total clearance down to 8 foot exactly by removing the trailer from the tow vehicle and lowering the front support (front wheel - it's called??) all of the way down. If I can find a garage with an 8 foot clearance - I might be able to push it in my hand. Might be a PITA - but possible. Might by a compressor and take some air out of the tires too if necessary. The dealership is also talking to a custom trailer manufacturer to see about building a trailer that would drop the overall height - something like a 'low-rider.' I am waiting on cost for that.....

Hopefully the houses my wife likes also includes the 8 foot garage door. I suppose I will push as hard as I can for that - but she is 9 months pregnant - due next week....I will need to use my words carefully! LOL I can see a response something like - a home is for us and the kids - not for the boat.. ! LOL

This is ultimately crazy - you would think that every boat manufacturer would design boats to fit inside of an 8 foot garage door - at least. Especially a boat on the 'smaller' size of the line - a Nautique 230 or comparable - I can understand if that monster wouldn't fit.

Thanks for all of your help here guys! I will post again if I can find a garage that fits the boat.....

A friend of mine has an 08 210. He ordered it with the titan tower because it folded down lower than the standard tower. He has a tandem axle trailer and it gets under his 7 foot door by about a quarter of an inch.

"I might be able to push it in my hand."

While at the dealership, I advise you test that plan too. See if you like pushing your trailered boat around by hand.

Yeah, there's no way, unless the floor of the garage is not properly sloped (for drainage) that you will be able to push a SAN 210 into a garage by yourself. This will be especially true if there's a "bump" in elevation (For lack of a better descriptive term) to get into the garage like most have.

They do have those little powered trailer dollies that may permit you to get it as low as the jack but they are big $$$. Another option if the low jack position does offer low enough clearance would be to get a 2nd hitch with a significant drop in it or one of those fancy aluminum hitches with adjustable drop. Then you could keep the trailer level for over the road but drop the hitch/tongue as low as possible to back it into the garage. Just don't forget to drop it before backing it in!

I know nautique makes a tower to fit in more regular sized garages. Not sure which one it is though. Just call correct craft and get a straight answer.

Here's what I was referring to on the adjustable drop hitch:
http://www.andersenhitches.com/Produ...ombo-ball.aspx

Unless you have a lifted 4x4 I would think that a 10" drop would just about put the tongue of the trailer on the ground. You'd just need to support the tongue weight with the jack, remove the pin, lower the jack to the desired height, reinsert the pin, then completely lower the jack. At a certain height it may be too low to be able to swing the jack out of the way though so if you need to go that low you might have to use a low clearance floor jack to adjust the hitch drop instead of the trailer jack.

Like you said you could let most of the air out of your tires but you probably wouldn't want to store it that way because it might ruin the tires. So, you'd have to deflate them, then re-inflate them just to do the same thing the next time you take the boat out.

Would it be possible to remove the leaf springs and put in an airbag system? You wouldn't necessarily need to have a fancy system with on board compressor and what not. Just have them plumbed to a conveniently located inlet that you could connect your compressor in the garage to. So, you'd get home with the boat, deflate the bags to a suitable height then you could back it in and leave it as is. When you pull it out of the garage the next time re-inflate the bags with the compressor and you'd be ready to go. The supplemental airbag systems like this for the rear of trucks are relatively inexpensive so this might be a lot cheaper than the net cost of a new "low rider" trailer and could probably get lower since the clearance could be temporarily lowered below what would typically be safe for use on the road.

Just wondering if the airbag solution would work with a trailer with torsion axles. If yes, how much clearance can you gain by deflating bags completely? 6 inches? A foot?

I just made up that idea. Not even sure how feasible it would be. If it was a leaf sprung axle you'd have to fab up some sort of control arms. Torsion axle trailers may not even have the clearance for it.

My friend is in the same situation with his boat with torsion axles on an Extreme trailer. Needs to come up with 6" of clearance to get the thing into the garage. This is after doing everything suggested here (dropping tongue, deflating tires, setting torsion axles to lowest setting). What a pain.

What's making up that top 6"? The windshield? The tower base? Or is it tower legs? If it's the legs you could potentially cut off the offending piece then have a sleeve welded in to one end. Then weld a nut in there too that could be engaged by a bolt with a knob on it. Then you could unscrew the knob and pop the two leg ends off. If done right it could look factory and not reduce the strength by much.

He's got a VLX with the Illusion tower. The tow ball and beam that it sits on needs an additional 6" (maybe 4") to clear. This is after taking the dang towball off the beam. So it's actually the beam that's in the way. There's no way to remove it since it's welded to the tower.
Sorry for the hijack.

The width is going to be a problem too. I don't know of any boats that will go through a standard 1-stall garage door width wise. The boat will have to go on the double door side.

have you considered off premises storage?

Nate Christian (ride152)

I currently own a 2007 Nautique 210 with the original FCT. I currently keep my boat at my apartment complex where they have single garages and I believe they are 9 by 8 foot garage doors (8 feet tall). The way I put my boat in the garage is to put the tower down and back the boat up until the trailer wheels are just inside the garage (about 5 inches before the tower would hit the top of garage), then I unhook my truck lower the front wheel jack all the way down and my brother lifts the boat trailer with a little hand truck/dolly so I can flip up the front wheel jack and we lower the trailer onto a little furniture dolly. Then we push the boat the rest of the way into the garage and then lift the trailer again and flip the wheel jack back down so we can remove the furniture dolly.

Pushing the boat into a level garage is not as difficult as it sounds. When I take the boat out I move it out by hand also using the same process.

Just another idea that may help you get your boat into the garage. I have also included a cell phone picture of my boat in the single garage and below the trailer you can see the furniture dolly I use and the hand truck on the right side of the garage.

Does my boat fit in my garage? Why yes it does. I just back it right in. I just got finished with the outside of my boat cave. It's 24x32 with 10x11 doors. Sorry guys I had to reply. I am a little excited about it.

fct 4 tower fits in 7' garage. there's a 2010 on planetnautique with a pic of it in the garage and out.

Chris - I sent you a pm

I put on smaller lower profile tires on my trailer to help it fit in the garage. One nice thing about my house is the garage has an upward slope from the driveway to the door and levels out int the garage, which lowers the tongue even more. I also have a hitch ball on my riding mower to get it even lower. (you need a mower that has some weight to it) It barely scrapes by, but it does fit...

How many HP is your lawn mower and how much do you think your mower weighs? That's a great idea about putting a tow ball on it for moving boat around.

The newer the house the smaller the garage..buy old!! lol Mine has 2" to spare. Jet

Hey Nate.

I measured the height of my boat locker's garage door. The opening is 8 feet high, but since the door doesn't retract all the way up, the clearance is more like 7'6". My boat and tower pretty much get under that except ... and this won't be a problem with you ... the rear walk-through is also a hatch. If the rear walk-through hatch is open, it will hit the bottom of the garage door.

Speaking from experience.

Originally Posted by chris_b

Does my boat fit in my garage? Why yes it does. I just back it right in. I just got finished with the outside of my boat cave. It's 24x32 with 10x11 doors. Sorry guys I had to reply. I am a little excited about it.

Looks like you need a bigger truck and bigger boat!

A 210 with a FCT-3 will definitely fit in a 8' door, not sure about a 7'. If you buy a house this an 8' door you have nothing to worry about.

I got tired of folding towers on boats so I built this beast. Still haven't put the ceiling in but will this fall. 10'x11' doors like Chris'.

I was wrong in my post about the FCT-3 fitting in a 8' door. You would need 9' to clear it safely.

I have an 08 MB and had a similar problem getting it into my standard size garage door, ultimately spent 2K to raise the door opening to an 8' and solved the problem. Width wise, have a couple of inches to spare - tight fit though

I also use a riding lawmower (18HP) to move the boat around - biggest problem is trying to pivot turn the tandem axle trailer. If you have enough space to make turns etc; lawnmower works fine.

Originally Posted by jyoungusa

I have an 08 MB and had a similar problem getting it into my standard size garage door, ultimately spent 2K to raise the door opening to an 8' and solved the problem. Width wise, have a couple of inches to spare - tight fit though

I also use a riding lawmower (18HP) to move the boat around - biggest problem is trying to pivot turn the tandem axle trailer. If you have enough space to make turns etc; lawnmower works fine.

do you have any pics of the ball mount you have on the mower?

What i have noticed is no one has mentioned garage depth yet, I have a 01 SAN with FCT 1 and can easily fit in a 7" door with drop hitch, but the big kicker is depth. I know a lot of newer construction has shallow depth on the garage. You definitely want to measure trailer tongue to stern at least with swim platform removed. I am building now and had to extend my garage 4 feet to accommodate the boat. My tongue to stern w/o platform was ~23.5'

There is a picture of my setup at the bottom of the this previous thread:

http://www.wakeworld.com/forum/showthread.php?p=1618578

had a mounting plate welded and then bolted to the rear. Cost about $60 to weld/materials. Only caution I would make is that look at the rear axle on your tractor and make sure that it is sufficient to support the weight - my garden tractor/lawnmower is a 20 year old 18hp Sears Craftsman - lawn tractors were a built a little bit more substantial back then.

Hey guys,

I am hoping I have this problem solved.
We are going to build a house rather than buy one. We can't seem to find the 'perfect place.' My wife has a different definition of it than I, but I can't find a garage that will work...lol

Our builder has said he will put in a garage door that is 8 feet 4 inches. due to the Association, he won't go to 8 foot 6 inches.

Since the boat measures to 8 feet 4 inches, I suspect that I should be just fine using a drop hitch.

Aaron - I am a little jealous of your garage - well done. I actually followed your thread as you built it - very cool!

Thanks to everyone for their help, Wakeworld kicks A$S!

Cool man, building a house is a fun venture. You can save money going this route if you're able to do any work on your own and be very involved with each step. This all depends on the contractor of course. Housing prices are low right now and materials are rising so the savings aren't as good as they used to be with building vs buying already built.

I would push a little more to get the extra 2" on the garage is I were you. I've never heard of garage door heights being apart of a HOA rules.