www.iFourWinns.com

Hi all,

New member here and my first post. We recently purchased an '04 250 Horizon 375hp/Vovlo-Penta/duo prop. We're loving it and it is by far the best boat I've ever skied behind.

My question is to other owners as to the best way to lay the Bimini down. We tow it to a lake less than an hour from home, BImini up and folded in the boot without issue. The problem is that we need to lay it down in order to fit the boat and trailer under the carport at home, and we have a custom trailerable cover on order that states the Bimini needs to be folded in the down position. We've tried several different configurations to lay it down, and none seem correct or ideal.

Is there another 250 Horizon owner who might be kind enough to share their solutions for folding the Bimini flat?

Many thanks in advance!
michtx

Welcome Mitchtx! Not quite a 250, but on my 190, there are short legs that you use to lay it down (see the picture below). I also tow it like this for hundreds of miles at highway speeds with no problems at all.

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Alec

2006 Horizon 190
VP 4.3GL/SX, Sunsport

Thanks for the reply Alec.

Currently, we have the long legs (front ones) out of their mount, the middle legs disconnected and the top laying back on the short legs. We're thinking of using pip pins to replace the screws in the middle leg mounts to make this easier.
The problem is that we have to put padding at two points beneath the laid down Bimini and would have to bungee or velcro all the legs together in order not damage to fiberglass and upholstery while pulling the trailer.....

...but it seems like there's gotta be a better way....?!?

I don't think there is a better way based on the design and lack of engineering. I did basically the same thing and it works fine. You can look back at a post I did about the same situation. I bought the same ball pins that are used at the bottom of some of the legs.

Agreed, assuming the 250 and 230 biminis are the same, and I think they are. They redesigned the bimini in '06 because the '04/'05 design was WAY overcomplicated and had the exact problem you're describing.

Raising or lowering the bimini, for us, is a 2-person job in order to keep the long legs from scraping the windshield frame. When lowered, we wrap small hand towels around the lower ends of the long legs and attach them with velcro straps. That does a good job of protecting the upholstery, but it's a royal PITA.

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Mike
2005 Four Winns 230/240
VP 5.7GXi/DP
1998 F-150 XLT
Boat Pic

It is a 2 person job (3 ideally). We use soft golf club fuzzy covers to fit over the exposed ends of the poles and wrap the poles together with a ball end bungee string to keep everything together and save the vinyl and kind of protect the already scraped up side window frames. With it in the down position any cover would be unobstructed. Also when it is down, with the short poles connected to the holes near the floor to support the top, it is really stable. However it is a pain to try to clean the boat, put the cover on, etc. because you must either step over the apparatus on seats or crawl between the poles and the center seat. Poorly designed imo.

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2005 Horizon 250

We use the "crawl under" approach when it's laying down and have become accustomed to it. It's all definitely a pain, but on the other hand I do kind of like having the bimini supports inside the windshield, and the bimini in use is awesome with it's huge coverage area.

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Mike
2005 Four Winns 230/240
VP 5.7GXi/DP
1998 F-150 XLT
Boat Pic

Agreed. The expanse of shade provided is impressive, and I guess I took it for granted until recently when on a friend's boat with its little bimini - less in length, width, and height. Granted it was a smaller boat, 19 ft. I think. We had to hang towels everywhere to get more shade.

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2005 Horizon 250