The Bear Mountain Boat Shop

Speaking of kayak cockpits, Vaclav also describes a fine method of coaming construction using woven carbon fiber fabric. Look at the Builder's Pages, sections 15 & 16. I just finished building my cockpit coaming and rim using carbon, and am very happy with the results. I'll post pictures soon! J...

After a busy Fall season, I was finally able to finish stripping and fiberglassing my kayak deck and cockpit recess. It is amazing how much darker and richer the colors become! This design calls for the deck and hull to be joined without a shear clamp. I used a bead and cove along this joint, hoping...

I am happy to report that the glassing of the deck went quite well today. The three 1500 watt heaters, plus taping around the outside of the garage door, plus stapling plastic over the inside of the door allowed me to get the garage up to a balmy 67 degrees! I'll update one of my earlier posts with ...

Hello everyone, After some undesired time away from my project, I am finally ready to fiberglass the deck of my kayak. The trouble is, I live in Michigan, the outside temperature is well below freezing, and I am working in a normally unheated garage. While stripping the hull last winter, I would fir...

Asa, There was a day last year when I could not coax anyone to go paddling with me. Even though it was breezy, I was determined, so I took my 17.5 foot stripper out for my first solo paddle. I brought a five gallon bucket with me and put almost 4 gallons of lake water in for ballast. I alternated be...

As Glen stated, western red cedar comes in an amazing range of colors. For the kayak I am building, I too wanted some dramatic color contrasts. I found a couple of extremely dark brown cedar boards at a premium lumber yard. You might mistake them for walnut except for the light weight. They are actu...

During our first trip to the BWCA some years ago, we struggled with carrying loose gear on the portage trails. This included fishing rods & tackle, paddles, watter bottles, etc. Velcro straps through the scuppers work pretty well for securing assembled fishing rods under the gunwales, but they c...

That's a beautiful canoe, Mike! I really like the ultra dark accent strips.
Nice keeping the family involved as well.

Happy paddling!
Jeff

The straps do stretch a little, but that doesn't seem to be a drawback. Just like plastic packing tape stretches but still provides good clamping. In some places, I have found it useful to insert a small block under the strap to concentrate the clamp load over a strip that needs a little extra force...

There are ways to avoid visible fasteners. You mentioned cleats on the inside of the hull, but there are also varieties of hidden fasteners. I hung my canoe seats from the gunwales, but rather than a bolt on top, I ran the bolts up from the bottom and into stainless steel binding posts inside the gu...

Charlie,
That video is a wonderful documentation of a very fine looking boat ... but I am envious of your boat shop!
I am curious. Where is your home?

Jeff

I just posted a few new photos as I've made a little progress now on the deck. I was determined to continue stripping without staples, but was not sure how to hold the deck strips in place and also keep the hull on the forms. It seemed like wedge force from the conventional stapleless jigs might pus...

Thanks for the kind words, Bryan and John. Garage Space Yes, my buildspace is rather confined. I've been lucky that a kid's bicycle hasn't rammed into the hull yet, although I actually smacked her pretty good with a ladder once myself ... luckily just bruised the cedar a bit. I am still dreaming of ...

Fiberglass along the underside of the seat frame is an excellent idea, especially if you use unidirectional cloth (fibers running only along the length). For sure, you won't have any concerns about the strength of these seats!

Jeff

When I built my canoe, I layed a 4 ounce patch over the bottom and bilge, and then layed a full 6 ounce layer of fiberglass over that. I wet out both at the same time. This did work, although it was a real struggle to keep up with the epoxy because the two cloth layers and the bare wood soaked up so...