And another of Anna's Kayak alongside my Point Bennett.

Another picture.

Properly launched! It's now all outfitted with foot rests, seat, back band and thigh pads, same as the Point Bennett. You can blame Anna for the blue deck lines - she thought they would look good. I think she's now realised that my suggestion of black might have been nicer, so I'm sure I'll be asked to change them sooner or later.

So at the weekend we gave it some proper use.

Sat dawned calm, then at about 10:00 the wind gradually started to build. We had a fun paddle around lunchime, playing round the rocks in increasing waves, Anna in her new kayak and me in the PB. Then in the afternoon the waves had built more and Anna didn't want to play, so I took her new boat out for a play in the waves, and to try it out rolling. On Sunday the waves were bigger still, so it was just me again, until I met a couple of groups on the water and got chatting. It turned out that I knew lots of the same people as the second gang - hi James and friends - so hopefully we'll meet up again and paddle together. James is a part time boat builder and was already interested in building a wood kayak - I hope I can convince him!

So, after spending a few hours in the new boat, what can I say? - it's marvellous! My feelings have fluctuated a bit each time I've paddled it - as you can maybe tell from the earlier reports - but I was *really* happy this weekend. It's still early days, but current thoughts are as follows.

• It rolls very easily: I managed my first ever roll to the right on my first attempt, then proved it was no fluke by following up with my first rolls with the greenland paddle held in normal paddling position (unextended) to the left and right, again first time each way.


• I'm sure it will balance brace with a tiny bit more practice: I was only having to scull very gently to stay in place, I bet if I'd stopped I'd have balanced. Next time...


• It surfs like a champ. I can't claim the credit cos I've never had much luck surfing kayaks in the past, they've always tripped up or screwed off sideways, so it must be the boat. I never felt like it was about to trip up over a chine - maybe the deep V forward meaning the chines are softer than they might be helps? It picked up and surfed easily on the (decent sized) waves and swells in the open sea as well as in the waves on the beach.


• It has just the slightest tendency to weathercock if you look for it, but can be held in a straight line with no real noticeable effort when you're paddling.


• It behaved very well in waves, being easy to hold a course in any direction to the waves, including with a quartering sea from behind. Sure, it squiggles about a bit as big waves pass through, but there were no nasty suprises and overall it kept going in roughly the right direction. Still plenty more testing to do on this one in different waves, longer trips.


• As previously reported, it does carve turns, although not super strongly.


• Oh, it also attracts admiring glances!

I've been talking with some people - both on the kayak builders forum and the Delftship developer about whether Delftship did produce incorrect panel shapes or not. The most interesting (to me) detailed input has come from Toni V (thanks Toni) who took my design and moved the control points around while trying to keep the same lines. This was by hand so the result will not be identical, but it certainly looks pretty similar. Interestingly, the bottom panels as then developed by Delftship are *very* different shapes. For example, the ones I built from had a significant concave in the keel line at the stern. The new ones don't. I've sent these to Martijn, the Delftship developer - who is really friendly, thank Martijn - and will be interested to see what he makes of them.

You can see the differences even in the small picture above, where I've pasted in the linesplan and he panel development for the original and ToniV modified designs. Even at this scale you can see the designs are very very similar in linesplan but the bottom panels are significantly different. This is visible even though for some reason they are laid out different ways round for the two designs: keels together and sterns to the left in the original and sheers together and sterns to the right in the modified one. Check out the keel line towards the stern in both cases.

In both cases Delftship is set to show any developability problems in the panels. Interestingly it doesn't pick any up in the original (at this resolution) but does in the new model. Despite this he panels in the new model look a much more plausible shape to me, havin actually built the kayak now.

Click on the small picture for a full sized image where it is even clearer.

And while I'm at it, here is the final linesplan. Quite a V'd bottom, and very V'd ends. The keel line is slightly concave towards the rear, giving almost a skeg at the stern, aiding tracking. Lots of rocker, especially at the bow, for manoueverability.

I've been asked about the experiences I had with DelftShip producing panels which didn't work out right. So here's a picture. This is of the bow. The stern was very similar. In this picture

• the bottom panels are fully wired together
• the side panels are wired together at stem and stern
• accurately shaped stations are in place, temporarily glued onto the side panels to hold them in the correct position
• I've run a string from top of stem to top of stern, and measured down from it to the stations: this confirms that the side panels by themselves are forming prety much exactly the shape as designed
• as the picture clearly shows, the bottom panels are exactly the right length
• also, the panels are the right width at all points (eg panel width at the station exactly matches the length of the station edge)
• also, a photo from the top (not shown here) clearly shows that the chine (top) edges of the bottom panels are just the same distance apart side to side as the chine (bottom) edges of the side panels they should meet
• but the sides and bottom do not meet vertically!

The stern was if anything even worse: the design called for a very very slight hollow in the keel line to form almost a skeg at the back, but the bottom panels when joined again left a gaping gap to the side panels, and the keel line dipped down hugely.

Fixing this was not too hard in the end, with a long thin V of wood glued onto the top of each bottom panel at each end, then the bottom of the bottom panels trimmed (a lot!) as required.

I suspect this is due to twist in the panels. This does make them not fully developable, so it is fair enough for Delftship not to cope - and I was expecting a little adjustment to be needed - just not this much. I'm passing on this pic and the design file to the DelftShip developer - to whom big thanks for the free program to start with! - and I'll post any interesting developments here.

The new kayak is now even closer to being finished while not totally done.

• Coaming added: glass and carbon molded lip on a ply upstand.


• 6" RWO inspection hatches set into front and rear bulkheads, and bulkheads bonded in place.


• Brackets added to attach the backrest to.


• Yakima sliding footrests added.

All that's left is the final finish: sanding then maybe a final coat of epoxy if it needs it, then paint or varnish. Then add deck lines and bungees.

Further sea trials after adding coaming and bulkheads have shown the following.

• Previous comments about manoueverability, stability and tracking still apply.


• Still very light!


• I've now found it does turn when heeled, hurrah. Not super-strongly, and it turns very easily with a little extra effort on one paddle stroke anyway, but it does work. Good.


• The only negative though is that the secondary stability gives up quite quickly - at quite a low angle of heel - for me. I suspect this is due to the low freeboard: when the waterlevel is significantly over the side of the deck, there is no more hull to get into the water as I heel further, so no extra righting force being added. It's fine for my wife, the intended owner, though, since she is lighter.

Anna loves it which is the most important thing. It's just the right size for her, she feels much more at home than in the Point Bennett.

More pics to follow when the finish is done and deck lines and bungees are on, which will really finish it off.