Jack wrote; ->Since I'm a PaddleWiser of the post-sponson debacle, was wondering if anyone >ever did any testing of these auxilliary flotation devices in surf? With the >impact of surf on handling of sea kayaks in general, it would seem like you'd >have a very good chance of having these things yanked off pretty easily --- >or, worse yet, having one yanked off leaving the boat --- with or without >"high dynamic stability" --- in a pretty permanent 90 degree angle of bank. >Not the easiest thing to get out of! If you lost one, did the other tend to >go, as well --- in other words, were they linked together so if one went, the >other automatically did too? I have seen well-secured deck bags ripped off >sea kayaks in moderate surf, and my suspicion is that the s-word devices would >not fare any better. Any data, experience? I did do some testing of sponsons. I think my post to Paddlewise can be found in the archives. They did not come off in any of our tests. I suppose I could imagine conditions where they might be torn off since they are fastened to deck hardware and a boat rolling about in the surf really does get banged about a lot. Anything that can break a boat can surely dislodge some gear or fittings. To me the problems were not in their coming off but in getting them on in breaking waves and that old bugaboo, putting too much trust in a life saving device to get you out of what your ego or stupidity got you into. Cheers, John Winters Redwing Designs Specialists in Human Powered Watercraft http://home.ican.net/~735769/ *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.gasp-seakayak.net/paddlewise/ ***************************************************************************Received on Mon Nov 09 1998 - 10:17:45 PST
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