Wakeboard Tower
 

Has anyone installed a wakeboard tower? I have a Monster Tower that I am planning on putting on my 182 Barchetta and I am just looking for tips. The instructions are really good but they give you several options on where to mount the supports.

Thanks

I have a 1994 Barchetta 182. When you mount the tower, make sure to take pics and post them.

I bought my Mariah 182 recently and have had it out about 9 times. I love it. How do you like yours?

So far so good but I also just bought mine and have only had it out once. I posted a couple other threads as I am trying to figure out what to do with the hydrofoil that is on it. How does your boat handle? Does it plane well etc? Mine seemed hard to control but I think the hydrofoil is creating a bunch of problems as the front of the boat never seems to come out of the water?

the 4.3 is fine for a normal boat load and normal skiers/wakeboarders/kneeboarders/etc...

even with the 21p prop i pull everyone out easy

i posted the post about hole shot because i am not normal
i am 6'4" 300# with 4 kids
therefor my boat usually has 6 people a full cooler and is trying to pull a skier out of the water



if the foil is bolted on you can try it on or off and compare your results
just unbolt it

We have Samson Wakeboard Tower installed on our 252 Shabah. Here's some pics:

http://www.mariahownersclub.com/foru...2-1277_IMG.JPGhttp://www.mariahownersclub.com/foru...2-1248_IMG.JPGhttp://www.mariahownersclub.com/foru...2-1251_IMG.JPGhttp://www.mariahownersclub.com/foru...1_DSC_0173.jpghttp://www.mariahownersclub.com/foru.../1_promo_e.jpg

Samson towers are custom made to every boat and look absolutely amazing. I would recommend their product to everyone looking for a tower.

Check 'em out!

MariahMan,

Just wanted to comment and say that I love the last two action shot photos of your boat!

Definitely let us know how installation goes, and post some pics if you can. I'd love to add one, but can't justify the costs, maybe someday...:rolleyes:

Thank You! I got even more here!

I gotta agree, your boat looks fantastic. :eek:
Whoever took the photos for you did a great job.
Thanks

Thanks dudders!

The pictures were taken by my friend (schweddy on this forum) from the shore on the river. My dad was driving while i stood next to my friend and watched. He's a more experienced photographer than i am so he took the shots. He used my bro's Nikon D70 and his own 200mm lens. The specifics for each shot are seen below each image for those who are photophiles and interested.

Great pics.....nice boat! :)

Hello everyone, I have been looking for member photo's of wake board towers and so far I can only see Mariah Man and Border 1010. Do any other Mariah owners have towers? I really want to get one for next season, as the wake boards are always in the way, breaking toes, and pounding the crap out of the interior. If anyone else has photo's of towers, could you post them here.

Mariah man, do you have a picture of your tower with the built in bimini top open? I think that is a great feature. Being in the heat all day can be hard on the driver.

I'll take a look for you. Most likely if you don't see one in my uploaded images, chances are i don't have one. I still have yet to go through the majority of pictures from this year so who knows, i may find a shot somewhere. If i find any i'll upload and let you know.

Do you use the bimini top, or does it stay rolled up? My boat only came with the convertable top, which is good if you get caught in the rain, but doesn't work well as a bimini top.

Our boat came with the convertible top that has the snap to attach to the windshield. We used it as a bimini for a season but got the Samson bimini installed the next. During trailering or whenever we're not using it, the bimini stays rolled up in a cover and on the tower. Otherwise, it comes out of the cover, folds out, and clips onto the tower. We do use it a lot. If we are out on the lake for the day we do but if its just like an evening wakeboarding session, then usually not. We also roll it up when we put the boat on the buoy in the evening. It can get pretty windy on lake chelan, where it stays most the time.

It is really nice having a shady area on the boat. It's amazing how much the sun will take out of you if you spend 8 hours straight in it.

Is Samson Towers in WA. I really like the way they follow the lines of the boat. They make a sharp looking tower. I'm just north of the border, so a trip to WA would be quite easy.

When you had the tower installed how did they do the anchor points? Was there backing put in? How long did you have to wait, once you ordered it?

Samson Sports is in Eastern Washington. Contact Scott Parnell, i believe that's his last name, and let him know Ryan Trickett with the blue Mariah sent you. I've talked to him several times at the Seattle Boat Show. He may or may not remember me, but i think we have one of the only Mariah's with a Samson tower.

As far as anchors, the tower is attached at 4 points with thru hull stantions i guess you could call them. They have large 6" backing plates to help distribute the load on the hull. I may have some pictures from inside the hull of the mounts. I'll look for those as well. The tower bolts to the stantions and allows complete removal of the entire tower if need be, only leaving behind the mounting points.

We ordered the tower originally through the dealer we bought our boat. They took the measurements and Samson built the tower to those specs. I believe it took about 1-2 weeks after measurements were sent to Samson to get the tower delivered. Installation was about a day i believe. For the bimini, one of Samson's installers came out and put it on because every install is custom.

I'll see if i can find the bimini shots and mounting pictures for you.

Samson Sports is actually in Southern Washington, right by the Oregon border near Vancouver, Wa.

I've been looking online at some of the big name wakeboard tower manufactures, and I have seen a few towers on Mariah's.I have come to the conclusion that an
out of the box tower does not look good on a Mariah. The nicest one I've seen so far is Mariah Man's Samson. If anyone else has a tower, it would be great to see it.

Well i got a chance to go through all of the pictures that got taken over this past summer. No shot with the bimini up, sorry.

The picture i thought had the mounting of the tower supports actually had them covered by the carpet. So no luck on either shot. I may be able to at least get a shot of the mounting in a couple weeks after the boat is winterized. I gotta pull out the batteries so i can take a shot of the mounting while i'm there.

Update:

I did find this on ebay though:

There's a good example of how not to do a tower. It really ruined the lines on that Mariah, sorry to say.

Here's the whole listing: http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Maria...QQcmdZViewItem

[QUOTE=MariahMan;2249]
There's a good example of how not to do a tower. It really ruined the lines on that Mariah, sorry to say.

I have to agree with you on that one. I think custom is the way to go. It's more money, but you end up enhancing the lines and the look.

just ran across this thread....crazy....

i am undecided about it. I am actually the new owner of that boat....my first one ever... yes it looks a bit out of place on there but i wakeskate quite a bit and love the old school Fulks Mariah boats so i had a hard time passing this one up. and it was only 2 hours away in Des Moines. i have to take it half apart so the boat fits in my shop. if it becomes a pain storing it, (wich i think it is going to be) i might just ditch it. funny to see the pic of it on here. Thank you guys for the cool site..i have learned quite a bit here in the last few months..keep up the good work

Jon Barnes

Hey Jon, welcome to the club.

Sorry the first thing you saw was us ragging on your boat man, that's no good. We can't fault you since you bought it like that. Regardless, still a great boat with our without the tower.

Thanks for the kind words and we're glad to have you as a member. :wink_thumbup:

Jon, Your boat looks real nice, I especially like your choice in colours. Any Mariah is a good Mariah.
Is there any way of easily disconnecting the wake tower when storing or not being used?
Can you get quick release mounting brackets or catches for these things.
If I put a tower on my boat there would be no way I could store it under cover.

Way to go Ryan!! :rolling_laugh::rolling_laugh::rolling_laugh:

I agree though that it wasn't the best way to do the tower installation but it may have been simply what the prior owner could afford or he didn't think/know about the custom side of these things.

Either way....it's still a nice Mariah!

well thanks guys. Like i said before, i might ditch the thing if it becomes a pain. As for disassembly, the rear legs are in two pieces with a male/female connection and a bolt two feet up from the anchor point (just below where the bimini attaches). remove the bolts, pop the tower towards the bow and the legs fall limp aginst the side and allow the tower to tilt back. I use a few patio cushions to shim between the tower and the gelcoat when it is tilted back to prevent dings. It rattles like hell when on the water so i was going to ask if that was common to most aftermarket towers or does the old "you get what you pay for" saying hold true in this case? most boats i have been towed behind didnt have a tower..the only tower boat i have been on is a tige with a factory tower....it didnt rattle so thats why im curious about the one on my boat. thank you again for the kind words....i know that sucker is ugly...no hurt feelings from this end!!

I would hesitate to say that rattling would be common for all aftermarket towers, as well as the ‘you get what you paid for” (for some cases at least). There has got to be a way to make it stop rattling/stiffen it up. Maybe look for worn fasteners, joints with extra play in them etc. If you are really interested in getting rid of it, send your dimensions to Samson. I bet they could design a sweet tower around your already existing mounting locations.

As for the “you get what you pay for”… There is no doubt that paying more normally gets you an overall better product. But when I worked as an engineer for HO Sports/Hyperlite we had a “fleet” (3 or 4 depending who was on a trip) of top of the line Mastercraft wakeboarding and ski boats. The wakeboarding boats had the most poorly designed towers I have ever seen. They worried more about what kind of crazy designs could be CNC machined into their giant aluminum sides instead of making them actually function superiorly well. They flexed, rattled, came loose and were overall giant piles of crap.

You may notice that many hardcore/competition wakeboard boats have been refitted with nice towers like the ones Samson makes.

I was at the Seattle boat show last week-end, great show, much better than the Vancouver boat show. Sampson Sports was there, and I talked to one of the designers who had a lap top with him to show samples of towers. He had about 6 Mariah's, including Mariah Man's. I've decided that these guy's will build my tower for me, with speaker wires and built in bimini top. I've looked for a while now, and I haven't found any towers custom or otherwise that look as good as there custom tower, IMO. I may wait until the end of this coming season as I am probably looking at $3000-$3500. Other features I like are the ability of being able to colapse the tower almost completely flat for storage, with one person, without having to remove it. The mounting blocks are machined to fit the shape of the boat so there are no stress points on the hull. The use all stainless fasteners. Just a well built tower.
I wonder if my wife would think this a good birthday gift for her, then I wouldn't have to wait:wink_thumbup:

Yeah, there is no doubt Samson towers are some of the best out there. Good idea to get it wired for speakers, if you even think that you would put lights up there too, I would recommend that you also have them run some wires through for that too - it will save you a lot of swearing should you ever decide to add them.

I think MariahMan will join me on this next piece of knowledge. The only "bad" thing I can think of about Samson towers are the handles used to hold the joints together. They are pretty easy to drop when trying to assemble/disassemble which isn’t so bad, unless you are on the water (no big deal to get more.. McMaster Carr (http://www.mcmaster.com/) sells them for $7, but it is an easy way to ruin a day out on the water, it is probably not a bad idea to carry a spare in your boat). One of MariahMan’s is sitting at the bottom of Lake Chelan right now, the worst part of the whole thing is that the water was so clear we could see the damn thing sitting on the bottom just out of reach for our free-diving abilities. Luckily we could borrow one from someone else’s boat which was not being used and the weekend was saved.

Did you talk to Scott Parnell? I believe he's their rep or could be one of the managers, can't remember but i know he attends a lot of the boat shows. Great guy to work with.

That's great to hear that they've done more Mariahs. I think when we got ours done it was either one of or the first Mariah they had built a tower for. You can't go wrong with Sampson. They build a very high quality product. I would recommend you get it powder coated or make sure you polish it very good and apply some sort of metal protectant to preserve the luster of the tower. The powder coat will probably be easier to care for. Ours is just brushed aluminum and i don't think Sampson puts any sort of polish on it as the top plates that you can mount speakers and lights to are pitting out. We are going to remove the tower this year and take it to a local polishing company and have them do the whole thing then put a protectant on it.

The handles are pretty easy to drop if you are not careful. The reason we were collapsing the tower on the water was to fit under a low bridge in Chelan. Definetely a good idea to carry at least a spare onboard incase you drop one. As Jon (schweddy) said, it can ruin a weekend if you're stuck without it.

I just emailed the guys at samson for a quote on the tower with shipping and everything else. I agree with the powder coat like mariah man said. i live to close to the ocean to have it any other way. I chose to go with the black tower and black speakers. I cant wait to get a response from samson on the total costs and shipping . I am like a kid in a candy store or on christmas morning. I hope to get it real soon. :rolling_laugh: :rolling_laugh:

Any updates for us Darrell? I'm really interested to see how the tower looks on your boat, especially what color powdercoat you decide to go with.

Sorry I didnt get back to you sooner but I have been working out of town any way I had to replace my roof cause it started leaking and instead of just patching it I am replacing it.:( if I can get the insurance company to reimburse me for it I am getting the tower but we will see how that goes. I have been talking to them for 2 weeks now and I think they are going to send me a check. if I get the check from them I will be getting the powder coated black one to go with the checkered flag on the side but anyway I will let everyone know if and when i get the tower.

Re: Wakeboard Tower
 

you know i do the same with my 182...with no tower and i always woundered if it was stable with tower...my boat rides so far out of the water its almost unstable with just using pull ring...or maybe its the booze...oh did i say booze i ment soda pop...woot ...with 21 pitch prop i can get er up to 52 with six peeps and a full cooler..@4700 rpm...

Re: Wakeboard Tower
 

Do you know what is involved with the measuring of each boat? I'm down in Iowa and bringing my Talari 200Z to Washington is out of the question. I am planning on purchasing a Samson tower later this spring if it is possible to have it made correctly without giving them my boat.