Ralph Diaz wrote: <snip> I constantly hear the rap that you shouldn't buy a folding kayak because you have to assemble it all the time. People who say that don't realize that you can leave them assembled for long stretches of time if you have a place to store one that way <snip> In that sense, folding boats give you a lot of flexibility. If you want, you can leave it assembled most of the time and break it down for traveling. I've been leaving my Feathercraft K-1 assembled about 95 percent of the time. Although one the reasons I got it in the first place was because we are "space challenged," I rigged up a pully system to suspend it from the ceiling in the garage. The structure of the boat, with cross-ribs on either side of cockpit, worked well for this, as a two-by-four with 2-inch deep notches in it locks into the ribs, and I attach the rope which suspends the kayak to the center of the two-by-four. Frankly, I set up this system when I found that assembling this particular boat, with its fine tolerances, each time I went out on a day paddle for a few hours (which is about all my schedule allows most of the time) was a royal pain -- 45 minutes to an hour to assemble, and then about 30 minutes to disassemble. This was a price I was willing to pa! ! ! y, however, for a folding boat that performs as well as (or better than) many hardshells. Being able to take my boat along on our vacation to Hawaii this year also was a big plus. <snip> "What! You can cartop them?" Yes, you can. <snip> Yup, mine gets cartopped most weekends. One of the unique things about cartopping a foldable is to see it flex with the vertical movement of the car over bumps and depressions in the road . . . it's like it has its own shock absorbers. It does the same thing, though less pronounced, on the water. The feeling is a little odd at first, but I've come to really enjoy it. The boat feels like a living thing on the water. <snip> Sponsons probably would have made what turned out to be a life-threatening ordeal into just a mildly unpleasant experience.> One of the benefits of the internal sponsons on folding boats is that you can re-enter without using the paddlefloat rescue or having someone else hold the boat steady. I just pull myself up into the cockpit face down, flip over onto my rear, and then insert each of my legs into the boat. The downside, I have found, is that I've had a difficult time learning to roll the boat with the sponsons inflated. The wide beam of the boat and the large cockpit, which leaves a lot of room between my hips and the hull, don't help. I know Ralph says that you don't need to roll a folding boat because of their inherent stability, but I have capsized my K-1 unintentionally before, and I would like to do be able to roll it should the situation arise again. Any suggestions on rolling a K-1 (I've heard it can be done) would be much appreciated. ______________________________________________________________________ Get Visto.com! Private groups, event calendars, email, and much more. Visto.com. Life on the Dot. Check it out _at_ http://www.visto.com/info *************************************************************************** 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/ ***************************************************************************
In a message dated 1/31/00 9:52:46 AM, rdiaz_at_ix.netcom.com writes: << I think it is unfair to use labels like "manic" about other people's desires. That aside, there is likely no such thing as the perfect kayak. People should look around a little bit and then buy something. When you have that something for awhile then you can continue the search with a better set of reference points of what may be more or less perfectly suitable to you. >> It's okay, Ralph. I think I'm one of the "manic" lookers he's talking about and he's right, I've been manic about it. I did look and found what I wanted but then was told I couldn't have it because they changed it! So, I wanted to know what was like what I wanted. Then I got one but that one didn't work out and I was back to wanting what I couldn't have and what was kind of like it was broken! Sheeh, this gets wearing on the nerves. No wonder I became manic. BTW, there is such a thing as a perfect boat. It just depends on what day it is. You just have to narrow/define your terms a bit <G>. <<Also one should be careful in listening to recommendations unless the source has lots of experiences with lots of boats of the type. Otherwise you are getting one person's personal limited view. Also you need to know what type paddler he or she is, what kind of paddling they like to do, etc. and see if it matches up realistically with what you do or are going to do. To borrow from what I hear from my scientist friends, solutions are all in asking the right questions.>> Back channel is a great place to talk. I've enjoyed all the messages I've received and the funny thing is that most of them agree in general. Passions move some to different places but generally I got the same recommendations from a lot of quarters. I guess it helped a great deal that I could describe the boat I wanted. Something that surprised me was that there was a real limited selection of choices provided. I know there are many brands of boats I don't know anything about. I was guided to Matt's boats by many. I wanted a Current Designs Gulfstream and several people suggested the Romany 16, or the Pintail, which is too low volume for what I want. And then there were those who went farther afield with suggestions I understood were for boats that people obviously loved and wanted to promote but I knew where not where I wanted to go in getting a new boat. I learned a lot of things I didn't know and looked at resources I hadn't thought of. That is one of the great things about Paddlewise, the depth and breath of knowledge out there people truly want to share. <<> Sponsons, yeah, that's a good > topic, everyone should equip their boat with them...>> Sorry, Doug. I don't want to talk about sponsons. Maybe Ralph does but I've never even seen a sponson, I don't think. To all who have been of help in my search for a Gulfstream, thanks. I found one locally, it isn't purple but it has the '99 seat and is new. I have a warrantee to fall back on if the skeg gives out or anything else goes wacko, as seems to be my fate these days. I paid full price, I could have saved a few hundred if I had waited a couple of days but I usually do run headlong into Murphy. But I did get a yellow boat just like the one Woody started with. With all his tinkering I think we'll be able to tell our boats apart. What a great learning experience. Thank you all. I still haven't spent any time seeing at what the boat looks like. It is all warped in the tent I made of 2X4s and tarps to keep the ice storm off of it. I have high hopes for enough of a thaw that I'll get a good look at her before this weekend. Joan Spinner (a little less manic and getting better) * * * Looking for a thaw on the Chesapeake Bay watershed. In the back yard a red, CD Breeze and a yellow/white Gulfstream FINALLY (the next one will be a purple boat, though) *************************************************************************** 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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