Taylor Made Super Gard Boat Fender 5.5x20 Black Onyx

The Taylor Made Super Gard fender is the kind of gear you buy once and forget about, in the best way. It's a smooth-finish cylinder fender in Black Onyx, 5-1/2 inches across and 20 inches long, built to hang between your hull and a dock, piling, or another boat. Taylor Made sizes this one for boats in the 15 to 20 foot range, so it's a natural fit for runabouts, center consoles, small cruisers, and pontoon boats that spend real time tied up.

Here's why the size matters. A fender that's too small gets crushed and lets your gelcoat kiss the dock. Too big and it's awkward to stow. This 5-1/2 by 20 inch body hits the sweet spot for that 15 to 20 foot class, giving you enough cushion to absorb wake slap and the bump of coming alongside without taking up half your locker. The cylinder shape is the workhorse profile. Hang it vertically off a cleat or horizontally across a rail, and it does its job either way.

The shell is heavy-duty marine vinyl, so it shrugs off sun, salt, and the scuffs that come with daily docking. Black Onyx is a smart color if you're tired of scrubbing marks off white fenders, the dark finish just hides them. Inside, there's a built-in rubber football needle valve. That means you inflate it with a standard sports-ball needle, the same one you'd use on a basketball, and you can top it off in seconds if it softens up over a season. No special pump fitting to hunt for.

We tell folks to run one fender for every 10 feet of boat, with three as a practical minimum, so plan on a few of these if you dock regularly. They're sold here as a single fender, which makes it easy to buy exactly the count you need or replace just the one that's seen better days. You'll want a fender line to hang it, and that isn't included, but once it's rigged it just works trip after trip. Simple, tough, and sized right for your boat.