Some people are building the Stitch and Glue Guillemot as a Skin on Frame Guillemot.



Igor Ravbar <igor.ravbar@narmuz-lj.si> of Slovenia built the above take apart version.
Julio MacWilliams <juliom@cisco.com>
decided to build my Stitch&Glue
Guillemot as a wood and canvas. He sent me some pictures of
his progress:

#9
#4
#5 


I am building a wood-canvas kayak out of the forms that I
used to start building your stitch and glue kayak.
As I told you before, the forms are a lot smaller than what comes
up after stitching the plywood frames together.
I did not want to waste the forms, and the idea of a narrow kayak
was very appealing to me.
Then I read some books on baidarkas, and wood and canvas kayak
building,(George Dyson "baidarka",Wolfgang Brink "The
Aleutian Kayak", Putz"wood and canvas kayak building")
and an article in "Sea Kayaker" on building a greenland
kayak; and then I was hooked into frame and canvaskayak building.
So, I made rings out of the forms, and cut them so that they hold
the battens that go lengthwise.
And this is what I came up with (photo #1).
The first thing I did was the keel. I glued to battens (sp?) together
and let them dry while forced to the appropriate curvature, according
to the form offsets (keel points).
Photo #2 is a front upper view.
Photo #3 is a rear upper view.
The next photograph, #4 is a detail of the coaming. I decided
to learn how to bend wood, and this is the result. This coaming
I made with a 1 3/4 x 1/2 inch x 8 feet piece of oak that I left
for six days inside a PVC tube full of water. Then, I bent it
to shape by pouring boiling water on it as I bent it around a
plywood "egg", previously cut with the shape I wanted.
A flat coaming is only good for baidarkas, so I attached the coaming
to the kayak with C clamps so that it would dry out with the kayak
shape, (kind of a "horse saddle" shape).
The next photo, #5 shows a view from inside the frame. Notice
the excess of Gorilla glue. It was easy to remove afterwards.
Also notice the pine strips to distribute the paddlers weight
across many forms. This idea came from Putz's book.
The next photo #6 is a front view. Forms #0, #20, #40 clearly
show up in this one.
On #7 you can see forms #160, #140, and #120. I did not use the
rear-most one, #180, because it was too small.
The beautiful model in photos #8 and #9 is my wife. And the guy
with glasses on #10 is me. Notice the state-of-the-art saw horses
(garbage cans).
Now that the frame is complete, I am thinking how I would make
a second one. I would probably use the bow and stern pieces that
are used to make the Coastal. I guess I would use the Coastal
forms as well.
It would be nice to have had the forms for the fore and aft sides
of the cockpit. I had to make an interior form, not as nice as
the others,to give strength to the cockpit. That is something
to consider when doing the CAD design.
The next step is to coat the whole thing with epoxy and marine
varnish and sew the canvas. Then complete the coaming and attach
another wood strip to the keel for protection.
I am planning to varnish the canvas with aircraft dope.
Back
to Stitch & Glue Kayak page
Please Send E-Mail regarding this page to:
Nick Schade

Send snail-mail to:
Nick Schade
824 Thompson St, Suite I
Glastonbury, CT 06033
Phone/Fax: (860) 659-8847