Completing the Coaming

The coaming has been a challenging and slow process. Here is a shot of the coaming lip epoxied on to the riser with the finished fillet underneath. The fillet is thicken epoxy mixed with sanding dust from the black walnut. This is actually the underside of the lip. Once this was hardened I needed to cut off what remained of the top of the riser and then sand the whole lip down to the correct width and shape.

Here is the lip sanded and ready for installation. Its installed by putting thickened epoxy on the edge of the cockpit recess and the riser and then using 3/4" block spacers to create the space between the deck and the bottom of the lip as seen below.

The finished lip installed with another fillet on the bottom. Now it gets well sanded again and glassed from the top of the lip, around the riser and down under. A double layer of glass on the rear 1/2 of the coaming will give it extra strength. The coaming has required me to practice extra patience but I am pleased how it is coming out. Will post the finished glassed coat soon. Can't wait to put on a spray skirt and try a roll....or at least a paddle

Creating the Coaming

The coaming is made of a piece of 3" black walnut that comes with the Redfish kit. The black walnut coaming will match the stems. Here it has already been cut to the taper of the cockpit recess. A line is scribed along the recess to prepare for the cutout.

I used a fine tootch metal saber saw blade to do the cutout. You cut it just on the inside of the line and then sand it to the point that the cockpit riser fits snugly into it.

Here is the riser in the cockpit recess read for the lip. The lip is made from about 12 wafer thin pieces of 1/2" black walnut. They are laminated together with thickened epoxy and clamped in place around the riser. The riser has been taped since this is just to give the lip its shape. It will get expoxed to the riser in a next step.

To quote my son Ben " you can never have enough clamps when building a boat".

Below is the front of the cockpit. The lip overlaps and will later by cut to a perfect miter

While working on this I have also been doing some other steps. Below is a cedar block thats installed in the bow and the stern to provide a place to later drill a hole for the rope handles

This piece of 28" x 28" piece of strips will be glassed on both sides and used to cut out the two bulkheads later.

Glassing the inside of deck & hull

The big brown from the Salmon Rive in Pulaski, NY has nothing to do with the kayak except that I had fun in October catching salmon, steelhead and thie beautiful brown trout instead of working on it. But I'm finally back with a goal to completing it by March 1. I am not in a rush and find joy in going slow. Especially since this is my sabbath project. The fact is I'm not sure what I'll do when I finish it. I may have to just start another.

After glassing the deck I was able to remove the deck and hull from each other quite easily. I was very surprised. This then left the job of sanding them both down well in preparation for glassing the interior. Since that is not very motivating or fun it took awhile to get to. However, finally I just "bit the dust" and got it done. Not with the exactness of the exterior but with enough smoothness for the glass to lay flat without air bubbles. (although there are a few).

I used spreader strips in the hull and deck to keep it from warping and spreading or shrinking. I realized that it will do this very quickly. These are cut to the dimenstion of the stations that were removed from these parts of the hull. For the deck I simply used scrap pieces of cedar strips and masking tape to maintain the right beam.

The glass laid out very well in the hull with no cuts necessary in the bow and just one small cut in the stern to get it to lay flat. Redfish provides 6 oz. glass cloth. I did install an extra strip on the inside as well as the outside in the bow and stern and an extra strip of cloth around the coming in the hull. Every piece adds strength but also weight. I want the bow, stern and coming to be very strong since they will take the most use and abuse however careful I think I will be.

Here is the hull with the interior completed. I used strips cut to exact widths to maintain the width of the beam when the epoxy was drying. This will make it easier later to put both halfs back together. The exterior beam of this kayak is 23 3/4 inches. The next step is glassing the inside of the hull and then working on the coming.