Quarantine Kayak Build

A little back story first. I have wanted to build some sort of boat for a long time, but i have too many hobbies/projects already to justify it. While i'm still working full time right now, i wanted a non-house related project to work on in my limited free time. I have been kayak fishing for a few years now with a Feelfree Moken 14 and then a Hobie Outback. I generally end up fishing the Sonoma Coast or the delta around Rio vista. The Hobie does well, but it is a bit of a tank and is a pain to pedal more than a mile or two from the launch. Hopefully this build will combine the best of both the long slender Moken 14 and the mirage drive from the Hobie. Anyway, on to the pictures:

Cutting panels and epoxying them together:

I bought one of the Hobie Mirage Drive Wells for the inflatable boats and will use this as the drive well. It is cheaper to buy this entire pieces than it is to buy just one of the "click-n-go" mounts for the regular boat and i would still have to build a drive well. Hopefully this will help speed up the build.

I bought the Bixpy steering unit that they sell to use with their little electric motors. I plan to use this will a Hobie Twist-n-Stow rudder.

Stitiching:




Mock up with the seat from my Outback for reference. I plan to use a Vibe Hero seat ($100 versus $500 for the Hobie seat)


The vee of the hull prevents the Drive well from sitting all the way at the bottom of the hull.

So i trimmed the drivewell down slightly

Then i cut out an oval piece of plywood to match the drive well and grafted it into the hull to give me a nice flat place to glue down the drive well once the interior has been glassed.

This is where i'm at today, ran out of time while filleting the inside. will wrap that up this week and fair the inside and prep for interio glass later this week or next weekend.

Holy smoke!!!

Nice work. Can't wait to see some more progress pictures.
Did you make your own plans or get them somewhere?

Yeah, holy smoke. Do you have an estimate of what the completed hull weight will be?

Sorry, the plans are from JEM Watercraft. The boat is called the blue-fin 15-29. It will be 14'8" long by 29" wide and should be somewhere in the 60-70lb range. I'm not really sure how much the mirage drive, rudder, etc is going to add yet. All I know is that the hull is super light right now.

http://www.jemwatercraft.com/proddetail.php?prod=BF15-29

Very cool!

I always thought it would be fun to build this one, but don't know how I'd ever find the time to even get started on it:

What are you doing about running the lines for the rudder?

What joint did you use to connect the long sheets of plywood?  Wouldn’t it have been easier to join them then cut?  Or are they attached to a runner or something? 

Very cool!

I always thought it would be fun to build this one, but don't know how I'd ever find the time to even get started on it:

This one has a mirage drive in the design:

https://www.clcboats.com/shop/boats/canoes/waterlust-sailing-canoe.html

Wow, solid work there! It looks like it'll be fast! What are you planning to use to seal it with, more epoxy or spar urethane?

Damn COWBRO, you are very talented!

HazardousCliff,

It will get completely encapsulated inside and out with marine epoxy and fiberglass cloth. Then I'll paint 90% of it and probably just leave the fore and aft decks in natural wood with a varnish.

Crash,
The bixpy steering comes with 1/4" diameter plastic tubes that I'll run from the steering control unit through the hull to the transom almost identical to the factory hobie steering.

As for joining the longsections, they are just butted with epoxy and a small fiberglass slice over the joint. Due to the curves of the panels you would end up wasting a lot of expensive plywood if you joined the 4x8 sheets of plywood before cutting out the panels. The instructions were super clear and all panels fit perfect after stitching together. I was skeptical before starting, but now I am just impressed with the design.

NowhereMan,

Do it! I've been drooling over boat plans for way too long, kicking myself for not starting this project sooner.

WooHoo! This is awesome!

I have been dreaming about this... after some serious schlepping and hoisting off my Revo-16. I’m really looking forward to the final build pix and the use reports. 👍🏼👍🏼

Awesome SIP project    Can't wait to see the final product.

This one has a mirage drive in the design:

https://www.clcboats.com/shop/boats/canoes/waterlust-sailing-canoe.html

That one looks a bit sketchy to me. With 2 sails (with booms, at that), and no amas, I bet it would be tough to maintain upright-ness. Even their 0:45 video blurb it comes across as nerve wracking.

Bad ass!!
This is my favorite post of 2020.
Thank you! I’m looking fwd to seeing the progress.