I (finally) got a fish finder and wanted to install the transducer inside my kayak, near the rear. Unfortunately, there was no access, so I thought I'd add a hatch. However, there's no flat surface in that vicinity and I couldn't find any good info on installing a hatch on a non-flat surface. So, here's how I mounted a 5" SeaDog deck plate on a slightly curved surface.

First, I went to TAP Plastics and got a couple of scrap pieces of 1/2 inch "starboard", which is a brand of marine grade plastic. That cost me $2. I then cut out 2 rings from the scraps, one for the top and one to reinforce it from the inside.

To shape the top ring, I used a random orbit sander. The maximum curvature was about 3/8", so I had to sand it down to about 1/8" in the thinest spots. This was definitely the trickiest part, but the random orbit sander worked well---it removed material fast enough to make progress, but not too fast to do damage. I worked on it until there were no visible gaps. The only advice I have here is to frequently check your work. You don't want to remove too much material.

A belt sander made short work of the inside ring, which I ground down to about 1/8" all the way around. Next, I cut a hole in the kayak and drilled the mounting holes thru the kayak and both mounting rings.

At this point, I was ready to glue it and screw it (so to speak...). But, there's one technical issue with starboard plastic, namely, nothing sticks to it, unless the starboard is first heated with a propane torch. There are good videos on YouTube showing the process. In any case, you can easily test whether you've heated it enough---if water will no longer bead up on the surface, it's ready for gluing. I was a little nervous about using a torch, since I'd spent a fair bit of time fabricating the upper ring, and, after all, it's just plastic. It turned out to be a piece of cake. I rapidly passed the blue part of the torch flame five times around each ring, then flipped them over and repeated. For the black starboard, it's especially easy, since the heat causes a visible "shadow" effect. After this process, all surfaces passed the water test.

For sealant, I used Life-Calk (an expensive polysulfide caulk, available at West Marine) on the top ring. For the inside ring, I just used silicone. It's bolted down with stainless hardware.

I haven't had it out on the water yet, but I sprayed it all down with a hose, and there's no hint of a leak. I'm confident it's going to hold up.

I've discovered the secret to catching rockfish: Fish for something else.

Today, I paddled out and joined the fleet near the mile buoy at about 7:45am, hoping to catch my first white seabass, or my first halibut. I put a squid on, dropped it to the bottom, and brought it up 5 or 6 cranks. On my other line, I was casting a swimbait.

I couldn't keep the rockfish off the squid. Every time I caught one, I paddled a ways before dropping the line down again. I also tried bringing it up higher off the bottom, but whatever I did, the rockfish found it.

On the swimbait, all I caught was a 21" ling (my speciality). I actually had that ling and a decent-sized rockfish on my other line at the same time. That was fairly chaotic.

I could've easily gotten a limit of rockfish, and it woulda been a good looking stringer (blues, browns, and even a vermillion). But I threw them all back, so I could continue to fish with 2 lines. Anyways, it was a lot of fun.

Persistence paid off---I finally got a keeper-sized ling. Other than that, all I caught was a small rockfish and a pelican...

I launched from New Brighton at about 8:30am. It was like a lake out there, but so foggy, that I couldn't see the shore, or Spongebob. I was dragging a dead squid around, and small mackerel were jumping everywhere. So, I put a sabiki on my other line (never tried that before), and caught a few of them just for fun. I probably could've gotten 100 mackerel.

Anyways, I ditched the sabiki and tied on a swimbait, and on the first cast, the line got tangled on a pelican in flight. That bird pealed off a huge amount of line before I figured out what had happened. Fortunately, it came untangled with no harm done. I continued to slow troll the squid, but no takers.

About 60 to 90 minutes after starting, it was still thick with fog, and I was surprised to get a glimpse of the Capitola Wharf in the distance. At that point, I deduced that I was probably directly out from the Capitola beach, while fishing in maybe 30 feet of water. That's where I caught the ling and then the small rockfish a couple minutes later. Ordinarily, I would've thrown the small guy back, but I thought it might make the ling look bigger in the pictures. I don't think it worked, since the ling was way, way bigger in person than it appears to be in the picture...

I continued to fish until about 11:30, but I didn't get any more. I only saw one other boat out there (a skiff), and they said they'd caught a bunch of mackerel and jacksmelt.

I got the West Marine VHF 155 radio (it's a floating model) about a month ago and used it about half-a-dozen times. The battery pack is held in place by a cheap plastic latch that broke off when it was very lightly bumped on the side of my kayak. It's a lousy design and, in my opinion, not likely to hold up under normal use. So instead of replacing it with the same model, I decided to go with the Standard Horizon HX751, which is about the same price (and also floating). I haven't used the HX751 yet, but the battery system is certainly far superior---no way it's going to fall out unless the unit is destroyed.

I planned to be on the water by 8am, but got a late start and then after driving for 15 minutes realized that I'd forgotten some necessary items (like wheels). So, I ended up launching after 9am. By that time, there were several kayaks out there, a couple of canoes and at least one inflatable too. Anyways, all I caught was one undersized ling, but it was my first one, so that was exciting. As far as I could tell, nobody was catching much---all I saw other people land were a couple of puny rockfish and one borderline-legal-sized ling. I left about 11:30am, since I had to meet the wife for lunch, but the wind was picking up and fishing was slow, so I didn't mind (well, not _too_ much...).