Re: [Paddlewise] She Needs Good Design (was She Needed a Rudder)

Mmmmm.... my Pintail's skeg has no bungies whatsoever... and the slider
range is about 5 inches which gives good, fine control. The mechanism is
simply a thick stainless steel wire, stiff but flexible, which moves inside
a tube (internal to the boat) from the cockpit to the skeg box. Because it's
a thick, flexible cable it can push as well as pull, hence no need for a
sprung 'return mechanism'. The control knob is simply bolted to the cable,
with a support rod 'underneath' to act as a guide.

I saw a Nigel Foster boat once with a similar system - but they used such a
thin cable it easily got bent and then was useless. A friend has a
Silhouette an has removed the mechanism altogether.

I find the system is easily field serviceable - so long as you take a spare
cable with you! You can swap it round in an emergency if haven't a spare -
on the beach! Not really  a "maintenance headache" at all, especially if you
practice at home first.

The only weakness is if the skeg gets jammed - usually launching from a
beach where something gets in-between the skeg and the skeg box - you go to
deploy the skeg and the slider moves - but you bend the wire... 8-(

...You then can't use the skeg very well at all. Thankfully it cannot get
jammed on the water. Remember to retract it near rocks or when landing!
(Skegs UP!)

Both myself and my partner have had the cable bend and render it useless
ONCE! Now we instinctively, carefully and GENTLY check out the system
immediately after launching, if it's stuck we don't try to force it but get
someone to pull the skeg free from the back of the boat, this has fixed the
problem every time so far, though it does not happen often at all.

VCP have now refined the system (copying a KayakSport design) where the
slider system at the end you use has a very solid hollow tube which slides
back and forth - with the flexible cable held inside this tube and the
control 'knob' screwed through the tube to grip the cable. This does away
with the old support rod which lay parallel to the bendy cable. The flexible
cable is now not visible at this end at all. This means it would be
virtually impossible to bend the cable at the cockpit end of the boat... You
might still get some cable trouble at the skeg end - but in 4 years of using
the older system we never have...

As for outfitters finding them failing often - the same happens here in
North Wales - beginners hammer the kit and throw all sorts of abuse at them,
usually accidentally! If you looked at boats that people owned themselves -
I think you'd find that the failure rate would be much lower... I think most
of Nigel's hire fleet has the older cord and cleat system which can stand
abuse by beginners a lot better!

I feel the new solid rod system to be very robust - the only problem is I'd
have to change my boat if I want it - as it apparently can't be added easily
to my older version. At the last Canoe Exhibition in Birmingham, UK, Nigel
was having a good look at the VCP system - so it may well appear on his
boats sometime soon... once he gets his new factory in Holyhead sorted out!

I shot a little video at this exhibition - which included a shot of the new
slider in action... you can see it on:

www.fachwen.org

Keith

> From: owner-paddlewise_at_paddlewise.net (PaddleWise)
> Reply-To: PaddleWise_at_paddlewise.net
> Date: Tue, 25 Sep 2001 09:21:41 -0700
> To: paddlewise-digest_at_paddlewise.net
> Subject: PaddleWise V1 #1607
> 
> * The failure rate of the sliders appears to be higher than they'd like you to
> believe.   When
> I spoke to Ed at Explore Kayaking, the Canadian importer of NDK kayaks, he
> said that 
> he doesn't recommend the current slider because they fail too often.  He also
> said that NDK
> is reviewing the design and is toying with a different slider - one that
> dispenses with the rod.
> It is bending of the rod that causes the system to jam.  Replacing the rod is
> a maintenance
> headache.

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