life rafts
 

im seriously looking into life rafts for the v-20 since i plan on going out further within the next couple of years and i found a model that they say is for coastal water and then they have the ones that are for offshore. they seem to have the same basic things. balast bags hand pumps and canopies, where the offshore models get different is that they have flares and paddles and other sorts of things. but they basically look like they would do the same job. i also will have an epirb so i dont plan on spendign that much time in the water and in the GOM there is always some type of boat, aircraft or manned oil rig in the vicinity. i will have a ditch bag with the epirb, handheld vhf, gps, food, water, paddle, emergency blanketsm full array of flares and such, with teh appropriate 1st aid items. so is the offshore raft worth the extra 1300 dollars? thanks

I would say no, as even that you are going off shore, you are not going that far, that you are not near any real help.

I have my buds 6 man on my boat for late fall and earlie spring, Tuna and Cod fishing. I have seen some pretty good deals on some rafts on crigslist.

thanks,
mj, so if i read what you wrote right the 6 man less expensive model should work out for me?

these look identical but one says offshore and the other does not

http://www.starmarinedepot.com/Rever...mmander+6.html

http://www.starmarinedepot.com/Rever...Life+Raft.html

????

They look the same to me, and in there description they even say they are made of the same stuff.
I think the difference is all the safety equipment, and the hard case the off shore comes in for automatic deploy.

Some rafts also are not Coast Guard approved, and if you are commercial you have to have one that is.

You will be fine with the cheaper one!

thanks mj.

Offshore v/s coastal life rafts
 

Those coastal rafts I've seen varied from the offshore or commercial models by the number of air chambers in the flotation tubes. Some coastal models have only 1 chamber and 1 flotation tube. There may also be a difference in the ballast chambers. The high quality rafts often have volume of water ballast. I've had 2 rafts, one was found floating and the other was given to me because it was out of date. It turned out there was no local site to refurbish the raft and my kids ended up playing with it behind the house in the boat slip because we were unsure if it worked (it did work perfectly when activated....wished we'd kept it onboard). I've been 140 miles offshore without one, but things like your kids or grandkids onboard make you grow up and have some responsibility.

If you have an epirb what would the GPS be for and you can buy a handheld VHF that has a gps built in to give you location when you hit distress.

Cterrebonne probably has the same advantage we do in SW Louisiana, we're never out of sight of an oil production platform, even 100 miles offshore. I've know several folks that would not have made it back(including the folks that bought my Wellcraft 248), but were picked up from the water by oilfield crewboats. If you can get a message off, help is typically fairly nearby.

samething where i fish, always some vessel in the water. thats why i was thinking i didnt need a major raft.