Dave Gutierrez wrote: > > Alright. I am in a bind here so I really need some > help from all of you with foldables out there. I am > finally getting ready to leave Bahrain and get back to > the States so I am packing things up. Well, today I > went to work on my K-1 and I happened to notice, while > taking it apart, that two of the pipe segments would > not seperate from one another!!!! Hi Dave, I have covered this several times in my newsletter. Further below is from the May/June 1997 issue. I have done some more stuff regarding this but can't find it but will paraphrase some advice to try before resorting to what appeared in that 1997 article. It comes from Doug Simpson owner of the company. Fill the boat with fresh water about half way and swish it around in the boat. Empty and repeat the process with somewhat less water, not so much that you and an assistant or two can't pick it up and begin twisting the boat some; then empty. Next fill the boat just a bit with water and go paddle it preferably over some swells. All of these actions will tend to get water into the tube ends, perhaps enough to then take the boat apart. (BTW, If you insist on keeping the boat assembled, it is best to do so upside down which will move bilge water away from the tubes, especially the keel which is the most likely spot to seize up. Also do rinse it out regularly. And let air out of the sponsons (the sponsons pressing against the frame help give a curve to the boat, which is fine for paddling but in storage will also curve the frame and possibly stick connections together.) Now the advice from Folding Kayaker three years ago. It is mainly aimed at the K-Light but applicable to the K-1: HOW TO UNSSTICK A STUCK FRAME It happens every spring. No, not just the birds and the bees. Paddlers who have left their Feathercrafts assembled in some nice snug storage spot, go out for a paddle with the boat. Then decide to knock it down for travel somewhere and, well, it won’t knock down! This also happens during the course of the normal summer months paddling season. Feathercrafts left assembled from early in the season, get certain of their parts stuck or frozen together. This is not an indictment of what are fine boats especially the K-Light. It is just that the model is so ubiquitous that more cases of freeze up of them are being reported than of any other model of folding kayak. I’m hearing of cases all the time. Usually the K-Light has been left assembled for a year or more. I know someone on the West Coast who is extremely happy about the problem. She called me before buying a demo from a West Coast dealer and I suggested she see if the boat would knock down. The dealer, much to his chagrin, couldn’t (it had been left assembled for two years!) and had to hacksaw a piece or two. The already low demo price was knocked down even more and new pieces ordered at the expense of the dealer. Our new owner of the K-Light was delighted! What to do if you have a frozen K-Light? Well, the first thing or things obviously is preventative: Don’t leave the boat assembled too long, let’s say not beyond about two months. Also, make certain that all the connection points are lubricated whenever you are assembling the boat and plan to leave it that way for a period. The boat simply will not stick in ordinary use or if left assembled for trips and vacations. Step-by-Step But, OK, you didn’t do those things and your boat will not knock down. What do you do now? Before you reach for that hacksaw as did the dealer mentioned above, Here are a number of tips. They mainly come from Randy Henriksen of New York Kayaking Company in the heart of Manhattan (601 W. 26th St, 12th fl. NY, NY , phone/fax 212-924-1327) plus other measures I have seen elsewhere. 1. If the problem is a seized or stuck chine bar, make certain to first try to straighten out the bar. Both the chine and gunwale bars on a K-Light take on a slight curve where they meet in the middle of the boat and connect with a slider bar. (The chine bars are the more likely of the two to stick since they may be lying in bilge water and wet sand part of the time; the gunwale bars generally don’t give any difficulty because they are above it all.) So part of the problem is that the tubes are under sideward tension (as they should be for a good tight frame when the boat is in use). Very often, even in boats that seem stuck, by working on lining up the tubes in a straight line and then trying to twist or rotate the sliding bar, the adhesion is broken. 2. While doing the above, squirt some lubricant generously around the ends of the slider. People have tried WD-40 and other such products. Check out blister packages at auto supply shops for what might work to deal with seized or frozen bolts and nuts. Don’t worry about damage to the skin. Hypalon is used for all sorts of industrial applications including conveyor belts to carry corrosive materials. If you wish slip some plastic or cardboard behind the area to protect the hypalon although it really doesn’t need it. Another product that could work is Boeshield T-9, which is an excellent lubricant to use on the parts regularly as a preventative measure and is useful for working with parts when they are already stuck. 3. If the slider and tubes are still stuck bang on them. The purpose of this step is to break adhesion and really does work wonders the majority of the time. But you don’t want to break or bend the tubes in the process. Randy recommends that you use a small block of aluminum to protect the tubes and slider. The aluminum block or plate should be about a quarter inch thick and the profile of a pack of cigarettes. This size of aluminum is the right thickness to transfer a lot of vibrating force from a hammer’s blow to the stuck area but also soft enough to be sacrificial, i.e. take all the dents while sparing the tubes any damage. Take the plate and move it along the area. First on one of the tubes just before it enters the slider area, then the slider itself and then the other adjoining tube. Be patient and do give it more than just love taps. The protective aluminum will allow some forceful hammering blows but not of the forging iron on an anvil level. 4. Try twisting the slider and tubes in opposite directions. You have to be careful here. A pair of ordinary wrenches will damage the tubing. I haven’t tried this but some of the strap type pipe wrenches on the market (which use a band of heavy fabric strapping instead of chain) might work to do this. Also a smooth faced set of wrenches and some rubber strips may also be able to get the necessary amount of opposite direction rotation to loosen the adhesion. Try this only after you have done steps #2 and #3 first, and remembering to use the principle mentioned in step #1, i.e. make certain all the connections are in a straight line. 5. If the problem is in the keel extension bar. This is also an area that gets stuck but seems less problematic. This counter-intuitive because the keelbar is most definitely sitting in bilge water and sand more often than the chine bars. There is so much length to the keelbar as opposed to the relatively shorter chine slider that you do have more of a chance to get a grip here for twisting and forcing the device open. Basically follow all the steps above, especially the banging with a hammer and aluminum sacrificial plate. Other Remedies I have heard of a case where a blowtorch was used to sweat the tubes and expand them enough to start rotating them, etc. This, however, has worked with the K-1 which has a different grade and thickness of aluminum from that in the K-Light. So it most likely won’t work without doing damage. And in any case when using such a radical device as a blowtorch you have to take all sorts of precautions to protect the skin. If none of the steps above work, then it is time for surgery. In order to reduce the chance of damaging the skin it is best to just make one cut in the stuck area. There are different arguments on which tube to cut. But it seems that the best option would be to cut on the tube end against whose rivet stopper the slider is abutting. Cut just behind that rivet stopper. Once the frame half has been removed from the boat, you could work on the end still holding the slider using a vise and workbench; with greater leverage you may be able to loosen it. This would mean you only have to replace the end that was cut. By the way, if you have several stuck stringers, don’t set out to cut at them all at once. Getting one stringer free by cutting may loosen up the frame enough that another frozen area may be loosened using the less radical steps covered earlier. u -- ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 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." ----------------------------------------------------------------------- *************************************************************************** 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 Sun Oct 29 2000 - 08:26:20 PST
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