First Launch of Tony's kayak,  "The Rory"......

The kayak is not officially finished but it is seaworthy and with cold weather approaching the timing was right for the first launch.  I actually built the table to start the kayak project in the last weekend of September 2002 and followed up by cutting and scarfing panels the first weekend in October.  So I guess the project length is a year.  I did take the winter months off from building.  I didn't keep a log but would not be surprised if I put in 200 hours or so.

Date:  October 4th,  2003

Time:  About 1 PM

Place:  Broad Bay,  Virginia Beach,  VA

Weather:  Well,  I had every intention of providing accurate weather information but the excitement of the day took it's toll and I didn't bother.  I do remember that the winds were supposed to be 5 MPH out of the South and they seemed to be more like 10 MPH.  It was in the mid to high seventies (air temp) and sunny.

Kayak design:  Chris Cunningham's Greenland stitch and glue from the Fall 1994 issue of Sea Kayaker magazine.  Luan (from Home Depot) was used in place of Okoume plywood.  Through-hull webbing was used in lieu of the recessed fittings shown in the article.  Since the kayak still has to be painted,  I simply pulled the webbing into place without sealing it to the deck.  The cutouts were well sealed with epoxy first of course.

Paddles:  Three Greenland paddles.  The paddle in the pictures is the first one that I made this summer by handsaw,  plane and sandpaper.  The other two were crafted the evening before the launch and the morning of the launch.  These were to be backup paddles for the day.  I did end up using the third paddle which is a bit more squared off at the ends and really liked it a lot.  I found that funny because it was the paddle that had the least amount of work put into it.  My only other paddling experiences were almost two years ago with a sit on top using a European style feathered paddle.  I  don't think the Euro paddle was any better than these Home Depot specials that I made.  I moved along just fine and really liked the feel of the wood in my hands.

Gear:  I made my sprayskirt using black neoprene.  My wife sewed the cockpit cover part and I made the tunnel and connected the two pieces.  I did a lousy job because the tunnel split after one use.  I know where I went wrong and plan to make a fix to it soon.  I had to make the tunnel in two pieces because of the size of the material I had available to me.  It kept water out and that was enough for that day.  I also made the two paddle floats on the rear deck.  I used an orange/old style life preserver which I cut up and had my wife sew the end into a sleeve.  The paddles will slide right in and it even has an adjustable strap with a lock for securing on the end of the paddle.  I decided to buy a bilge pump in lieu of fabricating my own since time was running short for launching this season.

Other:  I had a back band made but not yet installed in the kayak.  I wanted to paddle it first without any real seat/thigh bracing type outfitting done just to get a feel for what I might need or want.  I used a stadium seat pad as my seat and it worked fine for the 3 or 4 hours I was out.  I was able to knee hang but I could use a little padding to make it more comfortable and a little tighter.  My hatch covers were (are) still in the designing stage.  I used wood toggles on the inside that swivel around and lock the hatch covers in place.  I had a real hard time finding something to use as a handle on the top and finally went with bent flat washers in a pinch.  They held the hatch covers in place fine but I had not yet set the nuts on the toggles so they would slip sometimes and make them hard to open.  That is something I still have to perfect (as much as you can perfect hatch cover hold downs) and fix.  I did get a bit of water in the front and rear compartments but I think most of it was through the deck webbing slots which as I mentioned earlier were not sealed with silicone yet.  I would guess there was about 6 ounces of water in each compartment.

Handling and performance:  Ok,  disclaimer time....Not only am I a novice kayak builder but I am also a novice kayaker.  My only experience amounts to two days paddling a sit on top kayak.  So here are my impressions....

 Primary stability was a bit wobbly.  Actually it was quite scary at first but I got used to it after about an hour or so.  Secondary stability must be pretty decent because I managed not to flip the whole day.  I had a few tense moments but always managed to brace out of it.  Being a beginner I could only try and apply the strokes and turning techniques I have been reading about.  I can honestly say that I need to work on (make that learn) the forward sweep stroke as I found it very difficult to turn the kayak without doing a lot of reverse paddling.  I launched on a concrete boat ramp and found the experience of trying to sit in the floating kayak and securing my spray skirt a little wobbly.  I grabbed the dock several times to keep from going over.  I managed to shove off after all.  I did beach landings and launchings for the bulk of the day and found them to be a lot easier but the waves were practically non existent so that made it nice.  At the end of the day I ended up back at the boat ramp and found the process of exiting to the dock from the boat a real difficult and clumsy procedure.  I did it but I think my friends all pulled muscles from laughing so hard.  Towards the end of the day I made my longest paddle.  The wind was blowing pretty good and the boat did weathercock or maybe it leecocked.  Anyway,  it didn't want to stay on my paddling course but wanted to head into the wind.  I didn't put the retractable skeg on my kayak thinking that I wanted to learn how to control it without that.  Ambitious I'm sure but I still plan to stick with that.  I decided not to try my first wet exit and solo reentry that day.  I plan to take a basics course with the local outfitter in the spring.  I hope to do a bit of paddling mostly on sheltered waters after that.  I should be able to start learning some of these techniques at that point.

Pictures.....

Kayak loaded on my homemade rack.  The cradles come off when I'm not hauling the kayak.

Launching for the first time....a bit wobbly as I try to get the sprayskirt in place.

Technique?  What technique?  I'll work on that later,  this is my first paddle,  I'm just trying to stay upright.

Having a blast.

Making headway....

These shots actually came from digital video which a friend shot for me.  I hope to have some more pictures soon showing the deck rigging configuration.  Well,  that's all for now. 

Click here to see some pictures of the building process