river kayak

[marvinh]

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I live on the Clackamas river in Oregon and am interested in a building a kayak which would be good for rivers plus an all-around kayak for lakes also. Would the freeB work? Also looking at the curfew. I have built a Mckinzie Drift boat plus a teardrop trailer so I have some experience and the tools to do it. Any help is appreciated. Marvin

 

[Kudzu]

FreeB is going to be slow. Any short and wide boat is, there is not way way around that. Any of the others would be a better choice if you are remotely serious about kayaking. If you just want to get on the water and float around it would do that.

 

On my web site I have link to an article I wrote, Which boat should I build, start with that.

 

When you say river, that covers a lot. Are we talking current and shallow water? If so that is a bad combination, abrasion is your worst enemy. 

[marvinh]

Abrasion and current is going to happen on this river.  There is fast current and some mild rapids.   I looked at the video and the guy was hitting it with a hammer and a rasp.  I looked at a bunch of your kayaks but none that I saw said anything about rivers so maybe the skin type is not for me.

[Hirilonde]

It sounds like you want a boat for virtually all water conditions.  SOF in general is not great, maybe not even acceptable for some rapids.  But that aside, I don't know of any design, regardless of construction that does all of these conditions well.  It reminds me of the 70s when they made motorcycles that were supposedly good for highway and off road.  The bottom line was that they were poor for both applications.

 

What types of treks will you be taking might be a better thing to consider, or at least be part of what you consider.  Are you doing 3 day river treks with a few rapids along the way?  Are you doing mostly several hour day treks and interested in all of the conditions you mention but not necessarily on the same trek?  Where is performance most necessary and where is survival all that is necessary?  Is building it yourself important or is it more important to end up with the most versatile boat?  Any time you expect a lot of different things from a boat you will have to compromise most if not all of them to get some of all of them.  Is that acceptable?  Jeff in particular, but also many of the regular contributors to these forums can offer advice, information and such to help you make an informed decision.  But in the end only you can really decide what is best for you.

[Kudzu]

Abrasion and current is going to happen on this river.  

 

I would say to stick to Tupperware (plastic) boats. I have ruined two skins on two different boats in these conditions. Yes you can take a hammer to one but running shallow rivers is more like rubbing the boat with sanding paper over and over.  The same spots keep getting hit and pretty soon it wears though the fabric. This is the one time I prefer a heavy Tupperware boat.

[marvinh]

Thanks for the input.  My problem is that I enjoy the journey(building) more than the destination(usage).  So we'll see how it goes.  I need to finish my teardrop first and than I'll seriously consider your kayaks.

[Bcone1381]

Here is a product I thought might help with the abrasion issue on rivers. I have a sample but have not tried it.

http://www.keeleazy.com/page1/page1.html

[Placid Paddler]

On the topic of abrasion resistance, Dave Gentry has used PL Premium construction adhesive as the skin coating on the high wear areas of his boats. It bonds to polyester and nylon, but it is not UV resistant so it still requires a layer of paint or varnish for protection. I've used it in other wood working projects and is really durable and hard to sand, so it could be good for shallow rivers. The tubes only cost $5 at any hardware store. You just squeeze it out and spread it into the weave.

http://forum.woodenboat.com/showthread.php?121817-New-SOF-skin-coating

http://www.kayakforum.com/cgi-bin/Building/index.cgi/page/1/md/read/id/208339/sbj/skin-on-frame-durability-of-pl-premium-coating/

[marvinh]

Thanks for the info.  The keeleasy sounds good and I think I'll definitely go ahead and build a kayak.

[P Doug (WA)]

Knowing Oregon, I's say build the kayak,  there are hundreds of beautiful kayaking areas in Oregon.  You can't be far from some and as for the Clackamas, this would be great for a SOF:

 

 

 

 

This maybe not:

 

[Kudzu]

Nothing is going to really protect the skin from moving water and scraping the bottom constantly. The rocks will push the skin inward causing an impact on the same spot(s) on the frame or stringer, over and over and IT WILL wear through the skin.  No stick on layer of magic film will stop that. PL sure as heck will not stop it.  

 

If the current is strong it can break the frame and possibly trap you inside the boat.

 

These are sea kayaks and not whitewater boats. If you use it in current you can't say I didn't warn you.

[woodman]

I would do a cedar strip or S&G... They are easy to repair and light weight compared to a Tupperware ......They are tough...coat the bottom with epoxy-graphite....Sure they are going to get scratched and beat up..so what .. They aren't museum pieces....

 

 

 

 

[Placid Paddler]

Nothing is going to really protect the skin from moving water and scraping the bottom constantly. The rocks will push the skin inward causing an impact on the same spot(s) on the frame or stringer, over and over and IT WILL wear through the skin.  No stick on layer of magic film will stop that. PL sure as heck will not stop it.  

 

If the current is strong it can break the frame and possibly trap you inside the boat.

 

These are sea kayaks and not whitewater boats. If you use it in current you can't say I didn't warn you.

 

Constant abrasion will wear through the skin. I don't mean to be abrasive    and I'm not trying to say PL will make an indestructable whitewater boat, only that it could provide more abrasion resistance than paint or varnish alone. If I understand Marvin's posts correctly he wont be taking this in serious whitewater. He said current and some mild rapids. Cedar canvas canoes were used successfully in rivers for a hundred years.

 

Marvin should probably just buy a plastic river kayak, but if he wants to build his own boat maybe one of the more open top recreational designs like the Mess About or the FreeB would be better for a river. A wider bottom with more surface area would reduce the single point contact versus the knife edge keel open water boats. A lightwieght SOF boat would be easier to carry over low water obstacles and gravel, and an open top would make you more likely to jump out of the boat to do it.

 

Excellent point about getting trapped in the boat. Another good reason for a large opening on top

[Kudzu]

Cedar canvas canoes were used successfully in rivers for a hundred years.

 

 

Funny, I was just thinking that someone was going to point that out and I should have covered the difference.

 

There is one big difference in a traditional canoe and Fuselage Frame canoe, the frame.  A traditional canoe is solid wood skin covered in canvas. The wood is a backer and supports the canvas skin.

 

On a fuselage frame boat the skin is not supported except at the stringer. When you hit something, it lifts the skin upwards into the boat. In moving water the hit can be hard enough to lift the skin enough it hits one of the frames and pinches the skin between the rock and frame, especially at the keel/frame intersection, damaging the skin slightly. Once or twice wouldn't be a big issue normally. But you're going to hit the same spot over and over. It doesn't take much current for it to be a hard lick and that is why ruins the skin.

 

I went down what was supposed to be deep flowing creek on a fish trip with my Mess About and it turned out to be a lot of shoals with smooth rocks. In 3-4 hours it ruined the 8 oz. skin on that boat. Numerous small holes along the bow. There are no holes along the keel where it rubbed. All the holes at where the skin got pinched against the frames or the corner of a stringer.

[Placid Paddler]

You are the expert Kudzu. That is good real world data right there. I guess like all things on the internet, skin boat toughness tends to get overrated. Looks like I will be going back to building Kevlar and fiberglass for any boat that sees shallow water use.

 

EDIT: I'm just spitballing here, but how about stapling a layer of Kevlar stretched across the bottom stringers, saturate it with epoxy and add a layer of fiberglass over that for abrasion resistance. The rest of the covering would still be polyester fabric. That would keep the exotic fabric and epoxy costs down and still make for a very lightweight boat that has good abrasion resistance in shallow water.

[Placid Paddler]

I drew up a sketch to illustrate the concept.