Dinghy melted, what next?

[zachduckworth]

Hi,
Long story short I had one of those cheapo West Marine dinks that came with my boat. Little background, I have a 30’ sailboat that cruises around SoCal exclusively for now, and probably won’t go past Ensenada in the foreseeable future. I (admittedly dumb) stored it on the dock, bottom side up in SoCal weather for 18 months. This weekend I took it to Catalina and the glue on the bottom panel completely failed resulting in watery rides. Basically the bottom panel is coming off. So I need a new dink. My guess is the UV destroyed the glue. I tried patching it with partial success in the field, but the tape wouldn’t work all the way around the damage, which is frankly extensive beyond repair.

I am debating just buying a new cheapo (the WM $650 job) and trying to take better care of it. I’m not sure what that means covering it with a tarp or deflating and rolling it up after each use. (I use it a minimum of once a month for a few days at a time).

The other option is Hypalon, which I understand is actually faux Hypalon nowadays. WM offers the only reasonably priced Hypalon dink, which they want $1200 for. That’s the most I’d like to spend at the moment. I don’t trust WM products much, so I’m hesitant to throw down 2 x the price of the cheapo on a dink that had 6 reviews right now, most from some sort of sweapstakes.

So, my questions for the wiser are:

1: Does anyone have a real review of the WM Hypalon RIBs?
2: Is it better to store a PBC dinghy inflated and covered ay dockside or de-inflated and rolled up on the boat?
3: Does repeated inflating (12x times a year or more) lower the life of a PBV RIB significantly over say 5 years?
4: I could buy two cheapo PVC for the lowest cost Hupalon. Is Hypalon still worth it?
5: Are there other options I am missing?

I say 5 years b/c I don’t expect the WM cheapo to last any longer than that, although given the marine environment and price I thinks its reasonable enough. This seems to be what people get ftom
them.