To add to FrankenCub's comment, the rectangular brackets are for bows for holding covers up. The come in wood or fiberglass. They look like long slats and should be a bit longer than the length between the brackets. Thus when you put them in, they arc up into a bow. Some people use them on mooring covers or travel covers. They normally are not strong enough for much of a snow load. One problem with them is they can rotate and thus fall out of the bracket. Some people will tie a rope from one to the other and the ends to the boat bow and stern, tying them at the top of the arc so they don't do that. Sometimes people rig up a strip with snaps on them.
I see. Sounds like kind of a hassle. With our 15' boat I just use these posts to keep the cover up:
But still not any good for a snow load. We keep it in a small garage at my girlfriend's mother's house in the winter.
Speaking of the 15 footer, since I know you guys like old tin, this is our functional boat as opposed to the project boat:
It's a 1988 Smoker Craft with an evinrude 28 SPL, same year. Owned by my girlfriend's father since new, and always kept in a garage. It's simple yet almost pristine. He handed it down to her last year and I redid a bit of wiring that mice got to, rebuilt the carb, changed the oil in the lower unit, new impeller, new spark plugs, and had to replace the stator or some other electrical thing under the flywheel. Took it out today for the first time of the season and the motor started as if it was running an hour before. I should have been putting the next coat of spar on my transom, but the weather was too nice to resist:
I promise I'm not the kind of guy who puts his dog in every pic, but it just so happened that the first pic is the only one I have of the Smoker Craft without the cover on.
