Anybody build a small barge / raft / floating launching pad?

[upNdown]

This will be year 3 for the small backyard show, and me and my buddy are thinking about remote launching the show from a small floating barge in the pond. It's not just a whim. The "backyard" is mostly a small beach, so the crowd is typically a little closer to the product than they should be. In the years past, we've carried boards out onto the short rickety dock. But this means firing one board and rack at a time, then moving them off, replacing them and doing it again and again. With a barge, we could get everything out there at once, get it further away from the crowd, and have a proper show without stopping to reload the dock. We haven't laid everything out yet, but I'm pretty sure that something around the size of two 4x8 sheets would be plenty big enough for around 80 (mostly 200 gramish) cakes and 150 shells.
I'd love to hear from anybody who's done this.
My biggest concern is stability. I'm sure we can build something that floats, but obviously the trick is getting it stable enough so that it doesn't tip and dip and fire back toward the crowd. One idea is to do it relatively shallow, where we could easily anchor down all four corners tightly. If it could be built stable enough, I guess the best way to do it would be to float it out deeper and just have a single anchor.
All thoughts and advice are appreciated.
Thanks

[Mattp]

Pretty sure there is someone on here who does this.. cant remember who it was, but i def remember seeing pictures of it.. i have built a floating dock before though.. and there is marine foam meant for this purpose.. you basically build the dock around it.. it will be plenty sturdy from tipping.. but need to tie it sideways to prevent it from floating away

[jamisonlm3]

Just how small is this small pond? You can buy foam filled dock floats to put the plywood on top of. If the pond is small enough, you could use rope to tie the the whole thing to multiple ponts to keep it from drifting and then pull it back after litting it cool down after the show. Another option someone mentioned a while ago is using an old pontoon boat.

[upNdown]

The pond isn’t very small. But I’m told it stays shallow for a while, so like I said, tying down the corners to cinderblocks or weighted buckets might work.
As far as foam, I’m sure that stuff isn’t cheap. This is a cheap project. My buddy has an idea to make pontoon like floats out of big PVC pipe. I found some guys on google who did it with a series of 5 gallon buckets and a pallet. Those are the sort of things I’m considering.

[cherrybomb1]

I helped a friend build one and we used 55 gal plastic drums that I can get free at work.they just throw them in the garbage...to bad your on the other side of the country I could get you all you need for nothing.

[Kenny East]

Cheaper way may be to buy drainage pipe... The black stuff... Then either get the caps and deal them well or spray foam the ends shut. They're lighter than pvc, and just cost less.

That said if you made a wood platform that fit over a two man inflatable raft that was completely covered... Then put a few of them together it would work as well... Think each raft is rated to like 300#s... Usually run about $15-20 at wally world

[Pyro Paul]

http://www.instructables.com/id/Floating-Dock-with-Barrels/

[Mattp]

http://www.instructables.com/id/Floating-Dock-with-Barrels/

That is a great idea.. but i think its the opposite of cheap.. lol.. thats exactly what i was picturing though.. but with foam under instead of barrels

[liame]

i use an aluminum boat with plywood over the seats with the fireworks glued down to it.

[pyro4tsmith]

http://www.instructables.com/id/Floating-Dock-with-Barrels/
This method works well. I started out with 1 platform I now will have 4. Just use 4 55gallon drums per platform.

[upNdown]

Here's an update
(My buddy is able to scavenge some materials from his work, so we're trying to keep the costs down by using what we can get for free)
Here's what we've built:
Using 4 inch PVC, an 8x8 frame with a T joint sending a run of pipe down the middle. Two 1/2 inch sheets of plywood laid on top of the frame with the middle seem running on top of the extra run of pipe down the middle (seems counter intuitive, but with a total lack of wood framing to save weight, this seems like the way to go.) Drilled some holes and ziptied the wood to the pipe, and ready to launch. It floats. I actually supports a 200 pound man, but floats so low, it's easily taking on water.
Attached a layer of 2 inch insulation foam sheets to the bottom of the raft. Try again. This time it supports two adults and a child, though again, with that much weight on it, it's floating low. The plan is to add another 2 inches of foam. Hopefully that's enough to keep approximately 350 pounds of cakes and racks well above the water.
Assuming we can get it to float high enough for our comfort, stability won't be an issue. We do have some questions about anchors. With some directional cakes, we definitely don't want the raft twisting. Hopefully ropes on all 4 corners down to cinder block anchors will keep it from twisting or moving.

[PYRODAN]

I shoot off of 3 docks on a 3 acre pond. Refer to this thread. http://www.pyrotalk.com/bulletin/showthread.php?6015-My-2017-show
There are pictures of the docks and set up in the thread. I haven't been on here a lot lately, very busy with other stuff. Haven't even started on this years show yet! I need to get my dupa in gear!
If you have any questions, pm me. I will be on here more often and checking my mail regularly. Dan

[upNdown]

Very cool setup. And the show gives me some ideas . . .
Those are some great docks, built right, with barrels. Was that the first year you used them? They look pristine, but I'd expect a lot of those cakes would burn the crap out of the decks of the docks. I like how you have them staked right to the shore - that's got to keep them from moving or twisting at all. Since I'm using the water to get the show another 30-50 feet away from my crowd, that's not really an option.

[PYRODAN]

This will be year 3. the decks have a coating on them, I forget what it is called. My buddy who owns the place puts some kind of cheap particle board down over the big dock. So far we haven't seen any burn marks.

[PYRODAN]

I was talking to my friend who owns the property. We were talking about moving the docks out into the pond a bit as we had some minor fallout issues last year. We were thinking about running a rope from both sides of the docks to the shore. that's a fair amount of rope, and were not sure how well its going to work. were going to try it ahead of time and see what happens. Ill let you know when we do it.

[esgrillo]

I did 3 of them one year. My buddy made them and used foam and plywood and the were about 4x4 each. He fabricated some anchors to keep them in one spot. The worked fine but in my case I did not have many modules at the time so I had scab wire running all over the place. I only used them once because in my case it added a lot of extra work and really did not add much to the show. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kY2gKWpcE4w