Dave Kruger <dkruger_at_pacifier.com> wrote: >>I have been following this heavy boat/light boat thread with some interest. I have a boat which uses a "light" layup, and I am very leery of taking it out in even mild surf, because I suspect it would get broken. In fact, I know it will break in six-foot surf, because its predecessor (same model, same layup, AFAICT) broke forward of the cockpit when the previous owner took off straight toward the beach on a six-footer. It oil-canned and although the keel survived with no apparent damage, there was a crack on the deck, the side seam delaminated, and the coaming detached from the deck along its sides. So when I hear Matt say don't worry about breaking your boat, I wonder how I can tell what my boat can take.<< WHERE DID I SAY THAT? Let me be clear about this, IF YOU DON'T WANT TO WORRY ABOUT BREAKING YOUR BOAT, EITHER STAY OUT OF THE SURF ZONE OR BUY A SUPER HEAVY DUTY KAYAK. >>Let's hear what folks who **have broken** boats have to say. (Except for Doug Lloyd -- I think Doug is proud of having broken his British heavy several times!) I'd like to know what model you broke, and how you did it.<< I have done minor damage to some kayaks in the surf. Let see, there was the time I rear endered the original Sprite (lightweight hand lay-up--Cam was in a hurry to try it out so the first one out of the mold we laid up by hand--so it wasn't vacuum-bagged). The stern stuck in the sand and temporarily folding in the back deck leaving 3" vertical cracks on the back deck curves above the seams (where the folding stress concentrated about--midway to the stern--typical compression fractures). After patching it (easy) we also added a layer of glass in that kayak's hull to beef it up and used it many times in the surf after that without further damage. A lightweight vacuum-bagged lay-up would have done about the same thing under those circumstances. I'm sure I have put stress cracks in the gelcoat as a big dumper landed right on the front deck and buckled it down. They are hardly noticeable and of no real consequence to the structural integrity of the hull. When the XL standing on its own in the picture on our "History" web page fell over before I could run back into the picture to catch it we found some stress cracks in the gelcoat on close inspection. Hard to know if the fall created them or an incident during all the surfing I had done in that demo kayak did it, we may have just not noticed it before. Oh there was the time that I was surfing boat wakes just east of the Montlake cut and one big power boater thought he would be cute and gunned his engine creating a 1.5 to 2 foot breaker (soup) that drug my kayak sideways (with me doing everything I could to pull the kayak over it because I was about to broadside a big metal buoy). To no avail, my ultralight 35 pound 18 foot 5 inch long kayak hit the buoy broadside and bounced back up over the wave. As it was about to happen I was picturing the kayak completely broken in two around the buoy but all that happened was a good sized bruise in the hull on the side of the kayak that was down (I was leaned over so far trying to pull myself over that wave). I was amazed the hull was back in its original shape and I never even had to patch it. Sometimes a thinner more flexible laminate will have and advantage and this may have been one of those times. I still have this kayak to this day and have used it in numerous fun races over the years (We had it because it was just two flimsy (and it had been folded getting it out of the mold) to sell and we made the customer a stiffer lightweight one but put the flimsy parts together anyway to test the extremes of lightweight lay-ups) >>Then I'd like to hear what the manufacturer said when you took it back, broken, and asked if the boat was guaranteed against breakage. I'll start: Eddyline Wind Dancer, broken in six-foot surf, 200 lb paddler, no surf skills, went straight off, pearled, and oil-canned forward of the cockpit. Eddyline slimed on a cheesy glass patch under the deck and called it good. That patch came off easily (I **scraped** it off with a paint scraper), but the boat was restored to function by replacing the patch, replacing the side seams, and re-attaching the cockpit all of which added about five-six pounds -- making it an American light-heavy, I suspect. BTW, I sold it, and it never came back, so I assume it never broke again. I'd also like to hear Matt describe the conditions his Mariners will survive, and what the nature of the guarantee is if someone brings back a boat broken in surf (not by hitting docks, rocks, or a jet ski!!).<< We try to build the kayak the customer wants, within reason. Of course, most folks would prefer light as a feather, indestructible, and that we pay them to take it off our hands. We have to explain the reality, the choices that have to be made and what you are going to have to compromise to get them. The customer lets us know what they want to do with the kayak and what is important to them and we try to comply. A couple of times we have had to tell them "no can do". Audrey Sutherland talked to us about building a 30 pound Coaster. This was possible except she also wanted it to have what I calculated would add up to 9 pounds of accessories installed and still have it under 30 pounds. I remember one lawyer who talked to me for hours at a time long distance on several different occasions. He had decided on a Mariner and he wanted his dream kayak to be metal flake (requires at least two applications of heavy gelcoat) in some vague fancy design that he was not communicating to us very well (probably meaning that what we built him would not only be not what he had dreamed about but be so far from the norm and so expensive no one else would buy it if he rejected it). Still we looked into it and what it would cost extra to do. He haggled over the cost even though we were hardly asking anything more than it would actually cost us extra to do. He wanted a graphite lay-up so it would be lightweight. We told him the cheapest way to make it lighter would be to not have the multiple applications of gelcoat and the metal flake. He finally wanted us to sign a contract (he was a lawyer now wasn't he) that among other things the kayak had to weigh less than (I believe) 45 pounds (unrealistic considering the extra gelcoat and options he wanted--even in graphite) or we would deduct $100 from the price for every pound it was overweight. I laughed and told him that we weren't interested in building him a kayak. It felt real good to loose that sale. Some of my favorites have been the little ladies who want the super lightweight little kayak. When I bring up the strength issues involved with going too light they tell me they only plan to day paddle on the lake. About two months after they get their kayak they come into the shop and tell us how much they are enjoying it and how great the lessons are going and that they have signed up for the surf clinic. I try to remind them that the kayak they wanted was not built for those kind of stresses and cross my fingers. so far damage has been minimal. We will guarantee our kayaks will not break in anything short of surf or a hard collision with a solid object. But, if you take one of our kayaks out in the surf you are on your own. We have made some super-heavy duty kayaks for expeditions and Arctic explorations but even the best surfers like John Lull (of Surf Kayaking Fundamentals and Tsunami Ranger Rock Garden videos fame) want to find some compromise between "not having to repair it too often" and "light enough to accelerate quickly to catch that faster wave". His first Coaster was a heavy duty. Ten years of hard surfing in rock gardens later (and I'm sure some patches) his second Coaster was a standard lay-up with some crucial fold prone areas reinforced a bit and an extra layer of lightweight Kevlar on the inside (for rock bashing). The kayak we made for our friend Craig Peterson (cover photographer on some recent Sea Kayaker's--like surfing right at you--Oct.99--why couldn't he have saved that great shot for one more frame and I would have made the cover--and could buy five copies for my mother) but I digress. Craig planned to paddle to Glacier Bay along the exposed outside coastline solo (and did). The kayak we made him was so heavy duty that now he runs the bow up on the beach and then walks down the front deck before stepping off. Keeps his feet dry. It was a little heavier than he really wanted but we didn't want to see him stranded and starving on some remote beach after his kayak was smashed to bits by big breakers onto some rocky headland. We wanted his kayak to be able to survive that kind of potential abuse enough intact to be still paddleable. To paraphrase one wise sole who wrote a little earlier. Different paddlers have different needs. >>Who's next? - -- Dave Kruger Astoria, OR<< Yeah, I'm with Dave, lets hear those stories and don't pull any punches! 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/ ***************************************************************************
Matt Broze wrote: > > Dave Kruger wrote: > >So when I hear Matt say don't worry about breaking your boat, I wonder how I > >can tell what my boat can take. > WHERE DID I SAY THAT? Let me be clear about this, IF YOU DON'T WANT TO WORRY > ABOUT BREAKING YOUR BOAT, EITHER STAY OUT OF THE SURF ZONE OR BUY A SUPER > HEAVY DUTY KAYAK. Sorry about that. You never said it. My inaccurate, sloppy paraphrase. Got another question below about breaking boats. [megasnip] > We will guarantee our kayaks will not break > in anything short of surf or a hard collision with a solid object. But, if > you take one of our kayaks out in the surf you are on your own. We have made > some super-heavy duty kayaks for expeditions and Arctic explorations but > even the best surfers like John Lull (of Surf Kayaking Fundamentals and > Tsunami Ranger Rock Garden videos fame) want to find some compromise between > "not having to repair it too often" and "light enough to accelerate quickly > to catch that faster wave". His first Coaster was a heavy duty. Ten years of > hard surfing in rock gardens later (and I'm sure some patches) his second > Coaster was a standard lay-up with some crucial fold prone areas reinforced > a bit and an extra layer of lightweight Kevlar on the inside (for rock > bashing). Matt, on a typical vacuum bagged layup, where are the "fold prone" areas? I recognize this will depend somewhat on the design, but if you could generalize some, it would help. I have reinforced the deck of my main touring yak (Eddyline Wind Dancer) aft of the rear hatch, and am thinking about adding a layer or two of epoxy/glass to the underside of the deck, forward of the cockpit, as well. Any other locations I should consider? Also, is there a reference you can suggest for adapting vacuum bagging to a reinforcement job like this? I don't think my usual technique (wet out the glass with epoxy and squeegee the excess out) gives a very good job, especially when I want more than one layer of glass. (Usually let the resin get to the almost stiff phase before I lay on the second layer of glass, but sometimes I have tacked a second layer on top of a still-wet squeegeed layer -- the glass moves around a lot.) Thanks. -- Dave Kruger Astoria, OR *************************************************************************** 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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