RMR 14' Self Bailing Lace-Floor Raft, Welded Seams

This Rocky Mountain Rafts RMR SB-140 Raft is one of the very best values out there on fourteen foot raft. This raft has to go by motor freight since it is too large & heavy for UPS.

Rocky Mountain Rafts RMR SB-140 Raft – Outfitter Worthy Quality and Strength!

Many improvements have been made to both the floor design and the thwart attachment system the last few years. The pin system that holds each thwart in is quick if you wish to remove any or all of the three thwarts, and these thwarts are now beveled on the ends. This integrates them better to the main hull and when passengers sit on them, and it spreads the load to the thwart ends rather than just to the attachment points.

Also note that a drop-stitch floor version of this raft is also available for an extra $440

Rocky Mountain Rafts use Leafield D-7 valves on all chambers. RMR floor thicknesses are around 9" near the center of the 12’, 13’, 14’, and 16’ rafts. This is important to know if your drybox or cooler protrudes down much more than 10” below the frame bars. In some cases this is certainly adjustable if you use standard camlock straps, but if your cooler has a taper on the two long sides and tends to drop between fixed position bars until it stops, that may mean you are more like 12” below the frame bars.

The total depth of any raft will increase as the side tubes get bigger. On the 14’ RMR, you are looking at maybe 10 to 11”. If you have an existing frame and/or cooler and drybox, measure first to avoid problems.

Construction Method for Rocky Mountain Rafts RMR SB-140 Raft

Feedback on Rocky Mountain Rafts has been terrific and this company strives to make improvements both large and small every season. There are many imported pvc brands on the market, but with the exception of AIRE's Tributary line most have traditionally been glued rather than welded, and glue leads to eventual seam failures. Even if the better glued brands hold up for ten to fifteen years, there will still come a day when you have to put a large quantity of pvc in a landfill. Rocky Mountain Rafts boats have welded tube seams, floor I-beams, floor edges, D-rings, and bulkheads. In addition to the main overlaps, RMR also welds seam tape over both the interior and exterior side of each tube joint. This double taping is something that some pvc boat manufacturers don't bother with, yet a lack of seam tape often means their inflatables have air retention that is less than stellar, especially as they age. Not so with RMR - the extra step of adding seam tape to the interior prevents air wicking along the exterior edges, and the outside seam tape makes it even more reliable.

Individual pieces of the Rocky Mountain boats are not scissored out one at a time with hand-traced cookie cutter patterns the way some boat makers still do it. Instead they are cut en masse with computer controlled machines like the AIRE's and Tributary's. By foregoing much of the usual hand labor the cost to produce each raft or cat tube goes down. We are glad to see someone has taken the reigns to provide an extremely economical alternative to the many glued pvc inflatables out there.

Rocky Mountain Rafts RMR SB-140 River Raft's Hardware and Fabric

Most large sizes of the RM rafts have twelve stainless D-rings outside (& two more facing inward at the bow and stern), and six of these D-ring patches also have lift handles. Three removable thwarts are standard, handy for paddle crews. Even if you only plan to row, having the three thwarts increases the resale price since the next owner may want to paddle. The base fabric inside the 44 ounce pvc is a very strong 2000 denier polyester, and wrap-up layers on the underside of each raft toughen them up even more - though those extra layers also make any raft that has them a bear to roll up. Another important detail about boats from the Rocky Mountain factory is that they not only produce them from the ground up, they also make the material they are built with. This gives a far higher degree of quality assurance than you can get from Asian boat makers who have to buy pvc or rubber from an outside source.

Rocky Mountain Rafts RMR SB-140 Laced in Floors and RMR Warranty

A surprising feature of the Rocky Mountain Rafts RMR boats is that all sizes 12’ and up have lace-in floors, not permanently mounted ones. Should something happen to your floor, your can remove it & UPS it to RMR instead of trying to ship the whole boat on a truck line. Laced floors cost far more to produce, but they have the benefit of draining a raft quicker than glued ones can. It is quite unusual to find a laced floor on a raft of this low price.

Warranties on all Rocky Mountain Rafts RMR boats are five years. If you want to check lead times on an RMR, email us your zip code and we'll give you a close idea. The worst case should be five to seven business days.

Rocky Mountain Rafts RMR SB-140 Specifications and delivery Details

The 14' self bailing RM raft is a generous 7' wide with the thwarts inflated, making it one of the widest fourteens on the market and able to accept wider dryboxes and coolers than many competing, narrower models. The SB-140 has 20" side tubes. All Rocky Mountain rafts 12’ and up have four main chambers, plus the thwarts & floor. The 14' RMR weighs 167 pounds with three thwarts. They don't weigh much but removing them shaves off about 11 pounds. We know this is a bit heavy as fourteen footers go, but all that extra reinforcing material adds up. The straight section on this raft is about 80", though an 82" long frame will work. 84" would be pushing it off the chafer a bit.

* The RMR Rafts have Free Shipping for Commercial (non-residential) destinations in the lower 48. They can also be picked up at the shipper's nearest terminal. Note that this raft has to be shipped via motor freight, not UPS, and having it sent to a residential address can get very expensive. Commercial addresses are always preferred whenever possible, especially since the driver will not leave the raft at your house if you are not home. And they will charge a steep re-delivery fee if this does occur.