>Now I'm starting to wonder if I could buy one or two of the inflatable stablizers seperately from Scotty. If I use my spare paddle as the outrigger arm, I'm not carrying any additional weight. And I may be able to use the stablizer in leui of a paddlefloat, with the added bonus that it looks like it should be possible to paddle to some degree with it in place. >I could also see it being handy on long solo crossings, where you need a bit of stability to eat or answer nature's call. If I can get the stablizers seperately, I might start mucking around with this. Nothing ventured, nothing gained... You might want to try Seawings, made by Feathercraft (and earlier - by Tim Ingram, but I don't know if they are still on the market). Watertribe Magazine has an article with a good description of Tim's sponsons installation on a kayak ("Rigging a CLass 3 boat"). Or it was one of those kayak-looking Kruger canoes, I don't remember. Looks like an adequate stabilizer for choppy crossings, and enough to answer a nature call, provided you do this in a bailer-scoop or similar item rather than trying to stand upright (which I wouldn't do, firstly because there is no mast to hold on to, and secondly, because sometimes the wind is coming from the direction that you don't want ;-).... *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
>I actually tried a set of Sea Wings many years ago. I wound up returning them - I could not get them to ride above the water until leaned on, so they did create drag, which would have off-set the benenfit of any additional sail I could have carried because of them. Even if they had worked, I would not today buy any product that would directly or indirectly put a penny in Tim's pocket. The irony is Sea Wings would be of some use to some people in some situations. I've heard about all this, but didn't follow closely. And again, there are Wings by Feathercraft. You are right, the height of installation of sponsons is very important, and they should be pointing few degrees up (as in Watertribe photos). The guy in Watertribe has a lot of freeboard - must be one of those canoes looking like kayaks, but much larger. If the kayak has low freeboard, you can't mount them directly on boards - that would've been too low. Those on the photo by Scotty are still too low. From my experimenting with 9" sponsons, they should be suspended directly from the crossbar, with the upper side of the sponson pressed against the crossbar (which is not how Scotty is using them on the photo) and even then on the after-deck of a regular sea kayak you might have to raise the crossbar by a few inches over the deck, because the deck here is low. For sailing, I doubt that there can be any reliable way to mount them onto the paddle shaft so that they could be fast and easily attached any time, without drilling some holes in the shaft, so it would better be some old spare paddle. *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
[Please remove all old content that is not pertinent to your reply including old headers and footers. It's list policy.... this post was modified to meet policy] I actually tried a set of Sea Wings many years ago. I wound up returning them - I could not get them to ride above the water until leaned on, so they did create drag, which would have off-set the benenfit of any additional sail I could have carried because of them. Even if they had worked, I would not today buy any product that would directly or indirectly put a penny in Tim's pocket. The irony is Sea Wings would be of some use to some people in some situations. If he'd just let it go at that, fine. But he accuses kayak manufacturers and retailers who refuse to make his product a standard feature of being scammers and criminals. That slag includes my employeer, a business I know to be an ethical enterprise, and all of our competitors, many of whom I know personally, and who are also ethical and concerned with the safety of their customers. A lot of us here on paddlewise are refugees from an alt.rec.boats group that was completely destroyed by Tim's wild accusations and threats. He'd be banned, then resurface under another email addy, like Freddy from the Nightmare movies. He's his own worst enemy. Philip -----Original Message----- From: al.m_at_3web.net You might want to try Seawings, made by Feathercraft (and earlier - by Tim Ingram, but I don't know if they are still on the market). Watertribe Magazine has an article with a good description of Tim's sponsons installation on a kayak ("Rigging a CLass 3 boat"). Or it was one of those kayak-looking Kruger canoes, I don't remember. Looks like an adequate stabilizer for choppy crossings, and enough to answer a nature call, provided you do this in a bailer-scoop or similar item rather than trying to stand upright (which I wouldn't do, firstly because there is no mast to hold on to, and secondly, because sometimes the wind is coming from the direction that you don't want ;-) *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
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