A Use for Waternoodles - bringing the kayak home

With the old kayak, for years my preferred, tried and true method of carrying it on the car was to place four foam pads (as pictured here) on the coaming boards and then place the craft upside down on the roof of the car. I would then tie two ropes over the canoe down to four gutter hooks as well as tie the bow and stern to the car frame below the bumpers. For years one could buy a canoe carrying kit made up of these four pads, yellow polypropylene rope and 4 automobile gutter hooks. Such a kit is still available today for about $35.00.

Note front ropes pull back while rear ropes pull forward

This summer however I had seen water noodles used instead of the foam pads for carrying canoes on cars, how ingenious. This distributes the load over a larger area of the car top and better protects the roof from making contact with the canoe.

Water noodles are colourful long flexible foam tubes used as flotation toys and are available from the dollar store for $1 or for $2 or $3 in regular stores.

Schuyler cut lengthwise slits into the water noodles and then pressed them onto the kayak coaming. We then put the kayak on the car roof and tied it down in the conventional method. This method is well shown in the following photos.

Water noodles, straps and gutter hooks

In this particular case, the convex curvature of the car top was rounder than the kayak coaming so we doubled up a bit of extra noodle at the ends. 

The tie down method used here is based on experience borrowed from a long time canoe outfitter near one of our Ontario Provincial Parks. It is simple, effective and inexpensive. To quote Leonardo da Vinci, "Simplicity is the highest form of sophistication." The technique is typically used for North American open canoes but works just as well with the kayak.

There are a number of important details that must be followed to make this installation secure.

Two point hitch

1. The lines tying the bow and stern to the frames of the front and back of the car must oppose each other equally in the forward and aft direction. In other words if the forward ropes pull backward then the aft ropes should pull forward equally and vise versa. Otherwise the canoe will shift forward or backward during travel and in so doing slacken all the ropes further risking the movement and untying of the canoe.

2. The fore and aft ropes must be properly tied and anchored to the canoe with a knot and not merely allowed to slip through the pad eyes. This ensures that the craft will not shift from side to side. I found it easy to use a simple overhand loop that I tied in the middle of the rope.

More Details on the Tie down Method

Knots: Again keeping the installation simple, the only two knots required are the overhand loop and the half hitch. These are neither elegant nor sophisticated but do the trick quite well and are very easy to remember.

Overhand loop

The overhand loop is pictured here in a photo borrowed from Overhand loop knot where the knots are well described.

The half hitch pictured here is borrowed from Wikipedia.

To tie the canoe to the front and back of the car use a rope that is about the same length as the kayak ~ 5.5M or 18 feet. Larger vehicles may require longer ropes. These are typically used as lines to tie up the kayak when in use and floating.

Half hitch

At the midpoint of the rope tie an overhand loop. Pass the loop trough the pad eye or ring or cleat what have you on the kayak and then pass the ropes through the emerged loop. This then looks like a lanyard hitch around the pad eye.

Then create a two point hitch to the car. Do not make only a one point hitch to the center of the car since this will allow the kayak to shift in a strong cross wind. So what do we tie it to? North American cars have holes drilling into the frame under the car (likely to accommodate tie down hooks for ferries), while most cars  that are imported to North American have convenient steel eyes welded to the frames in all four corners. This is likely because the imported cars needed to be tied down for long voyages when imported on freight vessels.

So for North American Cars you will need to buy 4 "S" shaped hooks to hook into the frame holes. These hooks can be found at any hardware store.

Overhand loop and hitches

Pull the rope down through the steel eye or S-hook and then back up. Make an overhand loop knot at a convenient location in the upper part of the rope. Pull the working end up through the made loop, pull it back down and tie it back around itself with a number of half hitches. This is effectively a reef knot or granny knot. This method gives one a tremendous amount of mechanical advantage by pulling up thus allowing a very tight fit. In these pictures the rope was so tight that when we plucked it, it sounded like a bass guitar.

Repeat this process for each of the four ropes. The ropes at the back of the car will be much tighter than the front, but the front should be tight also.

Be sure to tie up the ends of the rope and leave no more than a couple of centimeters or an inch loose at the end. If the end is too long it will flap against the car and can severely damage the paint surface besides making the annoying flapping noise.

This installation as described so far is quite adequate for a short haul of an hour or so. For our trip to Nova Scotia which required a full two days of travel over 1500 km we used additional straps or ropes and gutter hooks as an added precaution. Like combining belts and braces, either system will work on its own. There are also kits with flat straps with buckles and gutter hooks that work just as well.
Strap vibration tip: In the case of flat straps, at high speed one can get serious vibration in the straps due to wind. To avoid that just put a twist in the strap in the part that is vibrating. This will spoil the laminar flow of the air around the strap and stop the vibration completely.

The pictures taken here were the exact installation after the first day of the voyage.

The First Launch/maiden voyage and Sea Trials (or Rather Creek Trials)

This afternoon we had some free time after work and the weather cooperated, also the paint has now hardened well on the Kayak, so we took the kayak for its initial launch at the Kars Boat Launch. Schuyler and first step cousin once removed Andrew Zeigler took the kayak "Sexy Girl" on its first voyage in Steven Creek a tributary entering the Rideau River at Kars Ontario.

The craft was fully water tight and performed well. The build was a success. This was a trial not only of the craft but also of the neophyte navigators.

Done!!

At around 3 pm today we put the last touches to the kayak. The first coat was pretty much dry this morning, so we proceeded to install the cockpit coaming , and then took the craft back outside. We then installed the keel, two bilge keels, the rubbing strips and floor boards all of which were already prepared and painted. We then applied the final coat of paint,  and then installed the eye pads into the wet paint thus ensuring a good seal around the screws.

From here on forward we will let the paint dry good and hard for two days before we try it in the nearest river called the Rideau River. This will require  mounting the canoe on the car and driving it about 5 km. to launch. This will be a useful exercise since we will also be taking this craft on our car to Nova Scotia. The trial will be that of properly mounting the kayak on the car so that it will endure the shake, rattle and roll, of the 1540 km drive to Nova Scotia.

There are a few small outstanding items to add like the back rests, if Schuyler wants them, but for my old canoe I used an old board foam life jacket that performed admirably as a seat and backrest and used it throughout the nearly forty years of paddling. I also did a lot of portaging with the old one so this required a specific yoke to carry it on my shoulders - North American canoe style. Seats and backrest just added extra unwelcome weight to the portages. I think Schuyler and his family's requirements will likely be different so they may wish to add a modified backrest and dispense with the yoke idea.This will be a project for Nova Scotia.

About the Paint

I was quite astonished by how much paint the boat required. While the instructions and plans called for half a gallon of paint we went through 5 litres or about a gallon and a quart. I suppose we could have stretched it some by thinning down the first coat which we didn't do but it could not have made that much of a difference. Also the canvas was not "proofed" as the plans require. Maybe proofing means something different but to me proofed meant waterproofed. After the paint is hard I intend to preserve the interior of the canvas by sloshing a litre of liquid wood perservative. This is what I did with the old boat and it worked quite well I recall.

If anybody knows what "proofed" means and if it does not mean to waterproof, please weigh in and add a comment to that effect. It would be much appreciated. We will now take a couple of days rest from the kayak. In the next blog post we will report on its inaugural launch, be it here or in Nova Scotia depending on the time available.

First coat of paint

Last night we finished the first coat of paint on the hull of the kayak. The paint soaked right through the canvas and it still feels tacky over the fiberglass parts. We will be doing the second coat today once the sun warms the air. The temperature dropped to 8°C or 46°F last night so it might be a while before it is warm enough outside.

About the Fiberglass Resin Hardner

I have always found that the instructions on the can are usually the most precise for the application of the contents, ergo hearsay is often misleading. In this case for small amounts the instructions called for 12 drops of hardner  for 30ml (ounce) of resin. I rummaged through the recycling bin and found and cleaned out a small cat food tin that held just over100ml of resin which required about 40 drops of hardner. Schuyler poured it all into a maragarine tub and mixed it. This gave just the right amount of product for one application before it hardened.

We followed these instructions exactly and found that the resin carmelized quite quickly and became quite hot. Funny how one only remembers by doing. I now recall that I used much less hardner on previous boat work than the container instructions called for. In fact I even remember now how with too much hardner, the final application became very brittle and that I always used about a quarter to a third of the required hardner and ended up with a rather nice supple application. The latter would not shatter when impacted by a rock while the the original brittle recipe would.

In the end we used about 10 drops of hardner with 100 ml (3 oz.) of resin. And that is hearsay.

The last Parts to build

Today we finished shaping and fitting the cockpit coaming, which did require much fitting and cutting where the two planks meet at the foreward point. This is effectively the last part that needed building so that is another milestone finished. The only thing that remains is some sort of a back rest for the forward position.

Second coat on nose with fiberglass.

We applied one coat of resin (proprietory formula to Bondo) made up of a styrene monomer to the ends of the boat as photographed. The resin soaks nicely into the canvas as the canvas becomes translucent. After that we sanded the first coat and removed some of the fuzzy bits by sanding and applied a second coat of resin along the leading edges and applied a strip of fiberglass cloth about 3" wide over and along the ridge hanging 1 1/2" over each edge.

Schuyler did a masterful job, sticking the cloth down with the resin by dabbing and stroking the fibres. We created little disposable brushes by furling bits of discarded canvas which worked very well. The end product looks quite professional and a lot better than my building project of the old canoe in '74. A trick which I did not know then was to cut along the warp of the cloth and then remove about 5 warp strands along each edge. This eliminated the development of loose strands that would get mixed into the resin and make it quite messy with blobs of string.

Planning around the Weather

Through Theweathernetwork.com we were able to have a pretty accurate play by play of what to expect for weather. This morning we had another marvelous day for working on the boat. We got two and some applications of fiberglass done outside. The fumes of that are quite unbearable so it was good to get done outside. In the afternoon we were planning to put on the first coat of paint on the canvas but decided to check the weather. Watching the radar screen with the time lapse images one can even predict to within 10 minutes when the storm will hit.  This afternoon we knew that we wouldn't have enough time to let it dry before bringing the craft indoors. This storm -- seen in this image -- was quite pronounced, sweeping a swath some 400 kilometers wide and heading our way. We are just south of Ottawa.

There was no avoiding it so we took our project indoors before applying the paint.

40 years ago the only advanced warning was thunder 10 minutes, maybe 20 minutes before the storm.

Hammer Nose

In this photo Schuyler got the claw of the hammer stuck in his nose, not unlike others that we know but will remain nameless that got a pea or marble stuck in his nose but at a much younger age. Good thing that this was easy to extract, since based on our last experience at the Kemptville Hospital Outpatients it could be a 4 hour wait. Since Schuyler was from away with no local family doctor, we thought that we would simple bite the bullet and wait at outpatients to attend to a not too serious problem. We arrived at 8:10 pm and finally left at 00:20 AM. It got to be quite unbearable really.

We have a boat

We made great progress today. The weather behaved wonderfully -- sunny, no wind, quite warm but not too hot. Because of the weather we decided to commit the entire day to the kayak.

In this photo we nearly completed the bottom canvas installation. The old canoe is on the ground behind me, which we kept handy for reference.

During the cooler hours of the morning Schuyler painted the rubbing strips that go on the gunwales, the bilge keels and the main keel (rubbing strip). We built and varnished the floor boards. After lunch we put the canvas on. I didn't remember actually how difficult it was from my experience in the original build. It was so much easier and straight forward then, profiting most likely from complete ignorance of the task at hand and blatant inexperience.

We managed to get all the canvas on and were hoping to have time to put the first coat of paint on but the sun was setting quickly by the time we finished the canvas. You will see from the photos that we had to move the project several times to keep the project out of the shadows and in the heat of the sun.

It is now starting to look like the lovely craft that it was intended to be. From this point on we are really finishing the canoe.

In this photo Schuyler is the proud future boat owner - somewhat amazed at what has developed before his eyes.

Some technical boring stuff:

To fasten the canvas, we decided to continue to go with Lepage PL Premium construction adhesive -- which we already used for the wood, and a regular staple gun and staples rather than copper tacks . Copper tacks are not a regular hardware item in these parts. Besides that the use of a staple gun makes the installation so much easier. I found that the few iron parts that I had on my old canoe didn't really show much corrosion, again because it was usually well stored, and such parts were well painted. In this case, there is one significant difference though. Schuyler lives in Nova Scotia where probably half of the paddling will be in salt water and half in fresh water. I very rarely ventured into briny water yet with the old boat so have no experience with the salt exposure.

Based on my professional career though, I do recall that salt water was significantly more corrosive on untreated steel. Another reason that I was not too worried about this decision was that for the old kayak the copper tacks had minimal impact on the integrity of the canvas installation. The tacks being almost completely tapered were extracted easily after a while and the glue was doing all of the work. Since we are using the very strong and effective PL Premium to hold the canvas, I suspect that the staples' main role will be in keeping the canvas in position while the glue hardens. My ony concern now will be if the staples rust if they will stain the fabric. I will be keeping an eye on the progress of this vessel and will most likely blog on this again in 10 years if blogs are still in vogue.

Fiberglass and Paint Purchase

Yesterday, we also purchased the paint, and fiberglass resin, resin hardner and cloth. The fiberglass materials were found in the automotive/bodywork section at Canadian Tire. The paint is regular exterior house paint.

The original plans call for copper rubbing strips to protect the ends of the canoe which today are pretty hard to find or costly. Back in 1974, as a substitute for the copper strips, I used fiberglass to reinforce the ends of the canoe to protect it against abrasion, wear etc. and worked very well over the years. Working the material is a little tricky and takes patience and some fancy techniques none-the-less. I hope I remember what I did last time. Fiberglass cloth often had a mind of its own and was hard to pin down.

The single largest purchase so far

Yesterday we bit the proverbial bullet and bought the canvas for the boat. It is without a doubt the largest procurement for the kayak.

Sexy Girl

During our shopping yesterday we picked up some paint for the boat. Schuyler wanted a bright orange colour and at the paint store he chose a nondescript colour swatch off the wall. The store agent proceeded to add colours and mix the paint which turned out to be quite a brilliant orange.

When we arrived home we looked a the paint can more closely and noticed a label stuck to the side with the particulars of this paint and the name of the choice of colour which was Sexy Girl.

Varnish is Done. Now Ready for the Canvas

We applied two coats of varnish to the finished frame, and like anything else, it always takes longer than initially calculated. Poking in and around the spars with the brush to get at all the wood and such is quite time consuming. You don't want to miss a spot now because repainting is not an option later unless one was to remove the entire skin. We completed the first coat inside since there was a threat of rain, and we would be out on errands afterwards and wouldn't be around to bring the hull back indoors in case the weather changed while we were out.

For the second coat we did it all outside. The difference in drying time was quite striking. The first coat was still tacky after returning from errands, while the second coat must have dried in less than an hour. It could be that the first coat being diluted 10% with paint thinner took longer to dry too. We used polyurethane varnish which is quite durable. In this picture is the craft after the second coat. Gee not too dramatic eh? Canvas will be on next. Since it has to be warm to put on canvas to let it stretch, we will wait until late morning tomorrow and work in the hot sun that is forecasted for then according to http://www.theweathernetwork.com/weather/caon0485/?ref=wxeyecitypagev2&var1=1073992960.

Should be good.

- Pieter

Frame Done - Major Milestone

Saturday morning we finished the deck stringers which quite nicely started to show the shape of the boat. This evening we completed the bent frames of which there are four. We also added some bracing to the frame in strategic spots . For a more complete discussion on that see boring stuff below for excessive detail and ramblings, if you want to. We are now ready for varnishing and canvas. Looks like a trip to the canvas store is next.

Boring Stuff:
When flexing the newly assembled frame I noticed a strange behaviour in the movement of the frame. I was of the false belief that once the ends of the stringers, hog, and gunwales were fastened to the end-posts that the flexing of the entire unit would become fully rigid which it did to quite a large degree. What I continued to notice though was that if I pushed down or up on either end of the frame that the opposite end would go up or down in the opposite direction, sort of like one of those manual reaching devices you see in supermarkets that has a handle grip that you squeeze at the near end and which activates a grabber at the other end.

I realized then that the stringers and frames not including the end sections between either end-post and the next immediate frame, actually acted like parallelograms and moved a bit and the stringers are not entirely rigid and will also flex. To reduce this motion further, we added cross braces to stringers in one section between frame 8 and bent frame 9. This is shown in the second picture. This should solidify the structure much more however, ideally to make the structure fully rigid would require these types of cross braces on all spaces between the middle stringers and frames. That will make for considerably more work and time delay which we really can't afford right now.
What this will hopefully do is stop the transfer of motion from one end to the other. What can still happen is the flexing between all the other frames, although because the joints are glued and screwed and thus will resist any torsion in the joints this should be much reduced.
Tomorrow when the glue will have set, I will see if the aforementioned behaviour has stopped or at least diminished.

About the Screw Heads Breaking Off

You will recall that we bought two packages of 100 screws 1" long at the start. We noticed that the quantity in that size is getting low. So on my way to the farmer's market in North Gower, I dropped in to our local Hardware Store - Perkins Lumber and picked up another package of 100 screws size 6 guage and 1" long.

This screw is of a different design than the screws purchased earlier.

In the first picture is the first screw type that we bought where the screw thread continues the full length of the screw right up to the head. It has no shaft.

The second screw type as shown in the second picture has a short section of shaft between the thread and the head.

At the start we found that with the first screw type we often broke the head off the screw even when screwing it into a countersunk hole and it happened before the head made contact with the wood. It could be because of the heat difference between the head and the shank since the screws got quite hot and the screwdriver could keep the head cold. It is more likely because of the poor design where the neck is very narrow at the base of the screw head, or a combination of both that and the heat. With the new screw style intuition says that it should perform better since the break was always right below the head and that part is now better protected. Also The later design allows the screw to grip more the fastening wood and less the part that is being fastened.

See comments below for discussion on an effective solution.

More Adhesive, Boat Safety Kit and other Purchases

We were approaching the bottom of our tube of PL Premium Construction Adhesive, so felt it prudent to replenish the stock soon. On an errand for other stuff, we stopped in at the Canadian Tire Store -- a veritable Canadian institution. As usual we also saw some boat stuff that we knew would be required and the sales were good so went ahead and made the purchases.

We bought an Emergency kit which I don't own yet, but is now compulsory aboard all boats operated in Canada. Until now, since the rule came into effect we have rented canoes which were supplied with kits. This equipment was on sale at about 60% off, wowzers!

The upper photo on the left shows the entire kit which is a yellow bailer with a blue lid. Besides the bailer it includes: signaling devices including a whistle, a waterproof flashlight and SOS Mirror (the silvered lid); marine rope and float to throw at someone to reach them, knock them out or get their attention. The kit contents as displayed in the second photo.

We also purchased some stainless steel 10 gauge pan head 1 1/4''and 1 1/2'' screws; line (nautical term for rope) for tying the kayak; two waternoodles -- more on that later; and two PFDs (Personal Floatation Devices or life jackets) on sale at 60% off -- more on that later too.

All Bottom Stringers Are On

All bottom stringers are properly fastened on today. Since the glue is a gap filler as well as an excellent adhesive, it is somewhat forgiving in joints where the meeting surfaces are not exactly flush. The resorcinol glue that I used back in the 70's had much more of a watery consistency, was considerably less forgiving and the surfaces had to meet with a minimal gap. Aren't technology and new building materials great. In this picture Schuyler is doing the final touches to the joint were the stringer fastens to the stem post.

Ready for Bottom Stringers

Gunwales were done last night. Schuyler is taking the sharp edges off the gunwales with a plane and sandpaper to fit the canvas. We are now ready to take it off the plank.

Fastening Gunwales to the Posts

The last finicky fastening job is fixing the ends of the gunwales to the stem and stern posts. After this the bird cage frame becomes quite stable and we can now apply the bottom stringers.

A difficult part is getting the end of the gunwales properly tapered to meet flush with the sides of the posts. We tried a number of tools, the block plane, smoothing plane and then the rasp but all were rather awkward to operate for this purpose as there was not much space. In the end what worked best was to us a handsaw and first cut an approximate bevel. Then using the saw flat against the side of the stem post just keep sawing layers into the gunwales paralell to the stem face. Worked pretty slick. The end result was a very nice fit.

Managing the glue tube

So far we have been using a large nail to plug up the end of the tube to keep the glue from harding in the tip or spilling out. The problem we are experiencing is that once the nail is pushed in it slowly wants to come out again. I had experienced this problem before with other caulking tube products. What I found was that often an air bubble was lodging inside the tube which acts like a spring. Air compresses under pressure but then slowly wants to return to its original volume. At some point while expelling the caulking compound one hears a pop which is the release of the air bubble. After that the spongy movement of the nail usually stops and stays put.
Over time we get quite a messy blob at the head of the nail as pictured here. In fact the nail is emerging during the taking of this photo.


So a second errand yesterday was to pick up some Twist-n-Seal stoppers from Lee Valley especially designed for this type of a problem. It is a narrow cone with a fine spiral thread that stays lodged in the tip. They come in packages of 5. We tried it today and it works very well. much tidier and easy to apply as pictured here.


Just push the stopper into the tip and then give it a number of twists for the spiral thread to grip.

Visit to The Chandlery in Ottawa

Today was an errand day which means a drive into town, and one of the errands was to visit the local ships chandler to find some type of hardware that could best be used to tie painters (lines) to the bow and stern of the kayak. We found Pad eyes as pictured here that seemed quite suitable, made of Stainless steel. Bill of sale is also added for interest.

In the Ottawa area I only know of one marine hardware supplier called The Chandlery. Although a chandler is really a merchant of any type of hardware or supplies, in our culture it seems to have migrated to mean specifically a supplier of all things to do with boats, from hardware parts, pulleys, shackles to marine toilets, paddles, life vests, what have you. Indeed there are peculiar parts that one can get there and not anywhere else.

Gunwales On

This afternoon we fastened the gunwales which has stiffened up the entire structure nicely. As soon as the gunwale ends are beveled and fastened to the stem and stern posts the structure will lock right up.

To attach the gunwales we turned the assembly upright and then placed the whole structure onto a straight and level 16 foot long nominal 2'' by 6'' plank (actual dimensions 1½'' by 5½''). Using a taught string for guidance, the keel was straightened ( a 1'' by 2'' (actual 3/4'' by 1½") is still quite flexible) and nailed onto the plank using a nail gun and about 5 finishing nails 1½'' long, 18 guage (pretty thin) at even intervals. This was much faster and more secure than clamps. We will simply pull the finishing nails through the keel wood when we want to remove it.


Using a carpenter (framing) square and string we then trued and guyed frame 10 (pictured here) so that it would stay perpendicular to the keel thus creating a firm and fixed plane of reference for the remaining frames forward and aft. we fastened the frames to the gunwales at exact equal distances at both sides again checking that the frames were square with the keel using a framing square.

Once on a role things moved quickly, gluing, countersinking, drilling and screwing all the joints.