Re: [Paddlewise] Skin on Frame Boats

On Mon, 13 Sep 2004 13:50:24 -0400, "Nick Schade" <nick_at_guillemot-
kayaks.com> said:
> Having dropped several of my strip-built kayaks from eye level and
> having them bounce I will say that it is not a great indication of
> strength for surfing and other real-world type forces.


There you go with a perfectly good technical argument against a
potential consumer marketting ploy.

I would suggest modifying your proposed test to using a sling of some
form instead of the saw horse, so that the stress on the boat was
transfered from two single contact points to a distributed band on the
hull. I wouldn't want to use a flat sawhorse for a test on anything but
a
plastic boat.

Then you head into the disagreements like where to put the support
slings and how wide they are.  Testing your boats I want the support
bands to be 1/4 inch wide right at the ends, for my boats I'll take a 6
foot wide strap right under the paddler ;-)

I still believe skin/frame construction per se isn't an issue for surf
use.

I've happily played in New England surf in a skin/frame boat, and I do
realize most New England surf is not an impressive test.


It would be interesting to run a test as you propose between plastic,
skin/frame, fiberglass, plywood, and woodstrip boats having similar
shapes, and similar weights to see how they hold up.  But I'm not about
the fund that experiment....

Kirk
-- 
  Kirk Olsen
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