>From: Strosaker_at_aol.com >Subject: [Paddlewise] Perfect Boat is Plastic! > >Shatterglass Paddlers, > >When people on this list have been talking about the perfect kayak, I am >surprised no one has brought up plastic kayaks. I own plastic and >shatterglass kayaks, and when it comes to really using (having fun) with a >kayak, it is almost always plastic for me. Sure, shatterglass is prettier, >a >bit lighter, and holds its shape better. But I'll take a little plastic oil >canning so that I can bounce off and slide over rocks without having a >second >thought about it. Does that make it perfect? I would think there is a lot more involved. > >At the Channel Islands down here is Southern California, almost every beach >is rock strewn, a nightmare for shatterglass paddlers. As Tom says later our party of six had no problems on Anacapa Island due to our choice of kayaks. I will admit there can be vast differences in the toughness of various fiberglass kayak models due to materials used, construction techniques, and even hull shapes. You didn't say which glass kayak you have that you feel you have to "baby". Of course, when I go skiing early in the season I take my rock skiis because they are so junky already I just don't care what I do to them. When you have nice things you tend to treat them better. I however revert to the "ram it full speed up the beach to keep my feet dry approach" once I have gotten a couple of scratches in the gelcoat anyhow. If the rocks are especially jagged and sharp edged or if there is enough barnacles that I can't miss most of them I will try to avoid landings on those spots if the waves are too big to step out in shallow water and look for a better landing spot nearby. Of course if I had a rotomolded plastic kayak I'd do the same thing to try to minimize the fins and curly-Q's that fuzz up the plastic and disrupt the smooth flow of water around the hull by sticking up into it. If I put a scratch in fiberglass it scrapes away some material rather than plowing it up into the boundry layer where roughness can really add a drag penalty. > If you don't paddle >across to the islands, then your kayak is thrown and stacked 5 high on a >ferry, another nightmare for shatterglass paddlers. Funny I know of kayak companies that ship their fiberglass kayaks packed into a large shipping container like cordwood and report no problems (it would worry me though that a hard raised spot on one kayak--like the peak of a coaming rim--might make a little dent in a new "green" fiberglass deck of the one it may be pressed hard against). My understanding is that the first shipment of plastic sea kayaks sent accross the country were packed in a rail car this way. Apparently, there should have been a sign on it warning the customer that "contents may settle in transport this container was full when it left the factory". I heard from those who unpacked them that some of the kayaks on the bottom were only 4 inches deep. This brings up another major problem with plastic. It is plastic (that is, it changes shape). Here is Eddyline's Tom Derrer being interviewed in Paddlesports Business (Spring 1999): "I've designed polyethelene kayaks for roto-molding for other people in the past." he says. "I'd always design a good beautiful shape that would end up nothing like my original design after the molding largely because of the unstable nature of polyethelene. It's always changing shape." Not only are they likely to be different than the designer intended but once they come out of the mold they aren't the same as others out of the same mold. I learned this because of my timing turn and spin speeds in a lot of kayaks. Sometimes I would test a kayak model i had previously tested to see what effect different water temperatures or densities might have on my results and also to test my consistency over time. One day I paddled a palstic kayak that I had timed years earlier. The results were astounding. It turned twice as fast as before, Before it tracked okay but now it was downright squirrelly. I knew I had improved my turning technique a little in the interum but not nearly this much. I called the designer to see if the design had been changed. He said no but my divergent results didn't surprise him at all "They are all different" he said. He then went on to explain how they come out of the mold all rubbery and someone tries to wrestle them into a reasonable shape before they cool and take that set. I have since done retests on other plastic kayaks and while the differences were more than with fiberglass none was as dramatic as the first. This means that if you are going to buy a palstic kayak it would make sense to try the one you are actually going to buy and then be very careful not to distort the shape too much after that. > Needless to say, you >don't see many shatterglass kayaks at the Channel Islands. Most local >outfitters won't even let you rent shatterglass boats to take over there. > >Sure, shatterglass is fine if you want to look pretty and always have a bay >or calm sandy beach to launch and land at, but if you want to have fun and >really use your kayak, then plastic is the material of choice. Go ahead, >drop it off your car, drag it across the rocky beach, get cartwheeled in the >surf, slam into rocks, seal launch! I tried unsuccessfully to find the newsletter article I read a few years back about the roof rack with four kayaks on it that slid off the roof of a car. Given the reputed toughness of plastic the occupants we surprised that even though it was one of the middle kayaks on the rack it was the plastic kayak that shattered and the fiberglass kayaks suffered either only minor easy to repair damage or some scuffs. If I recall correctly the plastic kayak was way beyond repair and offered in the newsletter to anyone who might want it for use as a planter. Some of my customers had a simialr experience. Come on, a little oil canning never >hurt >anyone! Oil canning (frog croakering?), and dents and distortions sure can be ugly and have some negative effect on the speed and handling of a boat but they are mild nuienses compared with some of the other disadvantages of polyethelene plastic as a building material for sea kayaks. Some even come pre-dented from the factory. Under the seat is a favorite place for them to dish inwards. shock cord bungees can create major distortions and most will dent just under there own weight (but a lot more on a hot day). >Date: Fri, 3 Dec 1999 16:44:05 EST >From: Tomckayak_at_aol.com >Subject: Re: [Paddlewise] Perfect Boat is Plastic! >Its nice you like your Tupperware. >A group of us from the Northwest went to Channel Islands and used the >shuttle >boat. We had Mat Brose to jump on the deck hands to keep them from over >loading kayaks. The Ranger on the island was concerned with our group >because >none of the kayaks had a rubber? I don't remember this Tom was that because they were afraid, what with all the comings and goings in and out of the sea caves we might get the island pregnant? >It must be all the sit-on-tops he sees. We >surfed and bounced around in the caves and landed on beaches. All the kayaks >survived. > >------------------------------ > >Date: Fri, 3 Dec 1999 16:54:54 EST >From: Strosaker_at_aol.com >Subject: Re: [Paddlewise] Perfect Boat is Plastic! How To Store/Car Top > >Henry, > >Oil canning is simply a dent. > >The best way to store a plastic kayak is to hang it sideways from two >straps, >both about a third of the way from each end. You also want to store it out >of direct sunlight and in an area that isn't too hot. After each use, I >rotate the side it rests on. Good advice here about switching sides this keeps it from wanting to paddle in circles. >As for car topping, use properly adjusted saddles that support the kayak >horizontally in the area between the side and bottom. You don't want any >weight on the area around the keelson. Do not overtighten the straps. >Taking the slack out is tight enough for me. The same goes for the bow tie >down. > >It really is funny how much abuse a plastic sea kayak can take when it is >paddled and easily it can be damaged when stored or car topped. > >Duane Strosaker >Southern California > >Date: Fri, 3 Dec 1999 19:00:30 EST >From: Strosaker_at_aol.com >Subject: Re: [Paddlewise] Perfect Boat is Plastic! Now Flex > >Shatterglassers, > >It is funny how in the world of skin boats (baidarkas and greenlanders), >flex >is praised for increasing speed and seaworthiness, but when it comes to flex >in a plastic boat, the shatterglassers complain about it reducing >performance. I've built a greenlander skin boat, and the amount of flex >(bow >to stern) is about the same in it as with my plastic kayaks. What do the >shatterglassers have to say about that? Contrary to the pipe dreams of the folding and skin boats set energy is lost to flexing and this is especially noticable when the force is applied off center as it is when paddling. There is a reason Olympic racing kayaks are made as stiff as possible. Every time I test paddle a rotomolded kayak I get the feeling with the first few strokes that somebody has tied a bucket to the boat and it is hurting my accelleration. I then realize that I'm paddling a heavy and soft plastic kayak and that explains the slow dead feeling I get when paddling it. > > >Date: Fri, 03 Dec 1999 17:10:10 -0800 >From: "Tom W..." <gadfly_at_tscnet.com> >Subject: Re: [Paddlewise] Perfect Boat is Plastic! Now Flex > >Okay-I'll bite, > > Fiberglass is lighter in weight near as I can tell. The color >also *looks* better in most cases [IMHO]. In fact if you made glass kayaks the same weight as you have to make rotomolded kayaks just to barely keep their shape you would probably find out that a well build glass kayak was tougher than a roto-molded plastic one as well (even when they are both new). Of course by the time they are both ten to twenty years old the plastic one has stiffened up a lot more as it has lost plasticizer to the environment. It gets stiffer and stiffer and more and more brittle in the process. Eventually and can be easily broken or might just dry out and crack on its own. Because it has no fiber structure to hold it together any crack will probably be catastrophic. When this grim fact becomes widely known the resale value of used plastic kayaks will likely plummet. Storing a plasic kayak in the sun, (or ozone, or around some breakdown products of natural gas) can greatly increase the rate of plasticizer loss. Some plastic kayaks stored outside in the Baja sun only last a few years. > > I know my skirt fit my Pursuits' coaming better than my Necky-that >has its down side to it, but over all, a securely fastened skirt is very >important I think. [This is even after I got my skirt stretched out >properly<g>] I have had the same experiences with spraydeck retention on plastic kayaks but you can get special tightly gripping spraydecks for them. Be cautious about using one of these spraydecks on a glass coaming though because it might be very hard to remove. To keep a spraydeck on in surf with a palstic kayak once I had to tighten it so tight it took two people to get it on the coaming. > > Due to storage requirements at my RVpark, I must "store" my >Pursuit on top of the truck [just as shown in photo on my page] so, >flexing is of course no real problem for me. But sun degradation sure would be! > I may be wrong, but I seem to recall finding out that it would be >easier to repair glass than plastic...? Right on the money with that one. A fiberglass kayak can be repaired to look like new and simple repairs are easy to do. Those plastic kayaks that can be repaired usually look like an ugly mess afterward. Repairing an old cracked plastic kayak is hopeless, it will just soon crack somewhere else. >Date: Fri, 03 Dec 1999 20:33:18 >From: Wes Boyd <boydwe_at_dmci.net> >Subject: Re: [Paddlewise] Perfect Boat is Plastic! > >Date: Fri, 3 Dec 1999 22:36:08 EST >From: Strosaker_at_aol.com >Subject: Re: [Paddlewise] Perfect Boat is Plastic! Channel Islands > >Tom, > >It is nice to hear that some of you Northwesterners where able to experience >the Channel Islands down here in California. The sea caves you mentioned >are >one of the big attractions at the islands. I've been banged around pretty >good is some of those caves, so my hat goes off to your for having the guts >to take $2500 of shatterglass into them. I'd be willing to take >shatterglass >into the larger and calmer ones, but then I'd be missing out on the tighter >ones open to the swell. We had both high wind and large swells at times but we wore helmets in the sea caves rather than hats. We definitely didn't go into some of the tighter caves exposed to the swell though because we weren't sure how far the breakers might take us back into them or if we could get our $2500 fiberglass kayaks back out if we lost them. Too bad nobody paddled plastic on that trip. We could have sent him in first to see if the kayak would make it back out or the breakers would just keep wedging its flexible hull tighter and tighter into the crack ;-) If the plastic kayak didn't make it back out again, well, good riddance to bad rubbish. > >I can understand why the ranger was concerned about you guys not having >rudders. As I am sure you know, the Channel Islands are notorious for high >winds all year around, making a kayak with a rudder, a skeg, or very well >balanced in the wind a necessity for any long distance paddling. Most sea >kayaks, most of which are made in the Northwest, are equipped with rudders, >which is why it must have been unusual for the ranger to see your kayaks >without rudders. Strong winds, rough seas, six kayaks, no rudders, no problems. Not surprisingly, no rudder problems either! (like the one my brother witnessed flake off the stern of a kayak when it hit a cave wall--must have been on a shatterglass kayak). >Date: Fri, 3 Dec 1999 23:28:36 EST >From: JSpinner_at_aol.com >Subject: Re: [Paddlewise] Perfect Boat is Plastic! Now Flex > >In a message dated 12/3/99 8:19:56 PM, gadfly_at_tscnet.com writes: > ><< I may be wrong, but I seem to recall finding out that it would be >easier to repair glass than plastic...? > > I must admit however, that you bring up some interesting points in >favor of plastic boats Duane, >> > > Okay, I'll bite. Glass my be easier to fix once damaged but it is MUCH >harder to hurt plastic than glass. I don't have to wonder just how much >water >will dump into my boat before I can get my skirt on once I'm in the boat >because I get in, put the skirt on THEN duck walk with my hands or push off >with my lovely Greenland paddle. My boat may be a bit lacking in shine on >its >underside but it sure isn't damaged. Me, I'm a lot dryer <G>. This is just what I do when the waves I'm about to enter might make it over the cockpit of my fiberglass kayak or I don't want to get my feet wet. What is your point? > OTOH, I do have a glass boat on order. I keep wondering if this >$2300+++++ boat is worth all the grief I'm going to get when the boat shows >up on the credit card this spring <G>. Maybe so maybe not, depends on the boat. What is it? I'm buying stock in the company that >makes 303. 303 with its sun-block properties might help slow sun degradation on your plastic kayak. Gelcoat does a pretty good job of protecting fiberglass from this and fiberglass is a lot less subject to that problem too (but Kevlar (TM) degrades like nylon). Well now that I have offended all the people on this list who love their plastic kayaks and didn't want to hear the downside I am going to sign off and duck all the flak by hiding out in the Sea of Cortez until the flames die down. We will be renting Seda fiberglass kayaks, however, I would be taking a folding kayak down like I did last time (Khatsalano) if the only other choice was to rent a plastic kayak. Matt Broze http://www.marinerkayaks.com *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
At 02:16 AM 12/5/99 -0800, Matt Broze wrote: > >Well now that I have offended all the people on this list who love their >plastic kayaks and didn't want to hear the downside I am going to sign off >and duck all the flak by hiding out in the Sea of Cortez until the flames >die down. We will be renting Seda fiberglass kayaks, however, I would be >taking a folding kayak down like I did last time (Khatsalano) if the only >other choice was to rent a plastic kayak. Matt, you make a persuasive case, and this will be waiting on your e-mail spooler when you come back from Baja. There is one area where plastic kayaks are far superior: Sexy, fast, well-built Mariner kayak, with all the trimmings: $3k+ Slow, rubbery, scratchable, dentable, fun plastic kayak: $1k- I wish I had the kind of money to buy one of your boats (assuming I could fit into it, never a safe assumption) -- but I can grind up the bottoms of three plastic kayaks for the cost of grinding up one Mariner. -- Wes *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
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