In a message dated Tue, 8 Aug 2000 9:30:05 AM Eastern Daylight Time, ralph diaz <rdiaz_at_ix.netcom.com> writes: --------------- Ralph Diaz . . . Folding Kayaker newsletter PO Box 0754, New York, NY 10024 Tel: 212-724-5069; E-mail: rdiaz_at_ix.netcom.com "Where's your sea kayak?"----"It's in the bag." --------------- .. This may be as good a place as any to talk about strapping down folding kayaks on a roofrack. ... Years ago I had Doug Simpson, co-founder of Feathercraft, here for a meeting and later we went paddling to the Statue of Liberty using 2 of his K-Lights and the Klepper Aerius I that I owned at the time. We made the boats in my hallway because it was wintertime in NYC and we didn't want to freeze while doing this. When it came time to put them on my minivan's roofrack, we discovered that some one had stolen the rear Thule rack. Since I had factory racks below them, we just did the best we could. We cartopped to the launch site and later back to knock down the boats on the street near his hotel on Broadway. As I pulled the rear frame half of the Klepper out of the skin, the chine rod came apart in my hand; it was broken. Here I was with a break in a wooden frame with, of all people, the major proponent of aluminum framed boats. Doug looked over and in his driest Western Canadian voice said "Ralph, does that happen often?" ... Ralph, I cannot resist: In the 25 years or so that I have been in charge of securing the boats to the roof rack, my old Pouch double has always got the bottom berth with any hardshells partly or fully on top. My roof rack (so old it has no maker's markings left) bars are merely padded with some foam pipe lagging. The old Pouch of course has no cushioning sponsons. Remember, I rely on the straps across the boats to hold them (see previous description), so I put them under considerable tension. I have yet to break any parts of the Pouch frame ... :-) Truth be told, your chine bar must have been weakened by something else because they do not just break from steady compression! "The Other Ralph" Ralph C. Hoehn Ralph_at_PouchBoats.com http://www.PouchBoats.com *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced/forwarded outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Tue Aug 08 2000 - 13:07:07 PDT
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