Expendable boat building - for canal use.

Yes they do,-- Shelac is insect **** mixed with alcahol, the alcahol also tastes like **** --beleive me.

a kiak kyiak kyak,-- what ever, is a posh word for a canoo kanoo kanoe,-- what ever.

 

So you're saying old sacks and alcohol soaked insect ****? You know guys there's cheap and then there's cheap.

Now how do I get this bl**dy Freeship working.

 

Expendable boat building

Do I have to remind you of the final score at Trafalgar????
Cheap indeed...and his lot resort to eating snails....pah....

 

Alexlebrit, your not getting much help from the commedians on this site.

From my experience this forum is made from commedians and serious boat builders, and a few like me, complete idiots.

People who want cheap makeshift type crafts, they don't usually get much help.

From your description of what you want to do, make a cheap construction then have to drag it around around locks and whatever is a contradiction.

If I wanted a kayak to do what you are suggesting I would buy a poly plastic craft, it would take lots of knocks. As Greenseas2 commented on, you could make a cheap kayak out of ply or insect coated bags but it would invariably get damaged, then what are you going to take spare ply with you, a sander and of course a generator to run the sander together with a few cans of resin etc. etc. So what looks cheap to build is always going to cost to repair, if possible.

Sit on kayak to sleep in. Once again a contradiction. If you have a kayak tall enough to sleep in, it would be too top heavy to sit on. In my opinion an open canoe would be better and take a one man tent. I would prefer to sleep on land than sleep in a canoe unless you know that a bloody big boats not going to hit or swamp you.

If you do need to take it accross land make some wheels to fit to the boat on one end, normally turn the boat upside down.

Of course I don't know the terrain that you are talking of as where I live we don't have locks or inland canals.

Well good luck and have fun.

Poida

 

Expendable boat building

Take your point Poida - but the 'sacking' and paint suggestions were seriously put. They were cheap - and proven in the past when materials such as ply and plastic were unobtainable. They work - as generations of current 'boaties' will attest - as most of us had our first taste of 'boat building' and 'floating' with craft constructed in just such a way. But as you point out - sacking and paint jobs need careful handling - and a set of wheels (an old pram chassis) for Axel would be a 'must'.

 

Bergy, haven't you got anything better to do than sit around playing with your computer?

 

Expendable boat building

Well...I have...BUT. The wife has this permanent headache...and the goat is too hard to catch...so I write 'romantic novelettes'...and click onto the forum (a) for a break from bodice ripping, and (b) to get back in touch with the real world....
And how come you're always there to snap up my 'unconsidered trifles...'

 

Checked the internet when I first got up.
Then went shopping
Came home had a cuppa tea during which I checked the internet
Then remembered I needed some 3mm twist drills for a job I was doing
Went down the hardware store came home, had a cuppa tea and checked the internet.

Now going down the workshop to use the afore mentioned 3mm twist drills.

As usual I will work down the workshop until I want a pee.

Come back to the house to have said pee, and probably have a cuppa, may check the internet.

I started writing once, got 1/2 way through and couldn't remember the names of the people in it. So I guess the way to do it is to write down the names of the characters and their description before you start and add to it as you introduce new characters.

For example you couldn't say Mary's raven hair hung around her face and then later on in the novel say The sun shone through Mary's golden hair.

Unless of course you write books for people with dementia. But then you would only have to write one page.

Anyway got to make holes.

Poida

 

Trifle is my favourite.

-
If I might suggest an Asprin for your loving wifes head ache. Funny that Thais never get that.

I dont mean to be pedantic or anything.

 

Comment by Jack

If I might suggest an Asprin for your loving wifes head ache. Funny that Thais never get that

What headaches or Asprin?

Headaches are when your brain aches. If you don't get them there's probably a good reason why.

Poida

Bergalia
Waiting for some paint to dry, having a cuppa, time to go back

 

Poida

Watch out for that paint --use plenty of ventilation or you'le get a head ache,.

 

Shoo, shoo get out of my thread - nah don't worry I like the comedy it makes you lot more real in my head (now there's an odd picture.

Bergy - just a quick clue... what's my name? Yes it's Alex le Brit - hmm so in terms of final score - we won - I'm a whinging pom, I just live with the cheese eating surrender monkeys.

And yes cheap and drag round locks may be a contradiction. In fact cheap is getting more expensive with every thought I have - ah well. It's almost at the stage I could go out and buy something now. Then again what I could buy wouldn't be what's now in my head, so why not have the fun of making it?

So what's now sprung to mind is a 6 metre kayak-ish boat, bit broader at the stern though to provide a sleeping area, but max beam at 1 metre. It'll be pedal powered, because I'm one of those odd recumbentists.

Construction? Having read all about folding PVC and aluminium kayaks, found the plans and checked the materials, it'll be similar to that, but foam cored with a 1mm PVC sheet skin - it's more than tough enough to survive being pulled up onto grassy banks - my unscientific test involved wrapping some round a breeze block, and towing it up and down the gravel track behind my lawn tractor I reckon we did about half a mile and it's worn well - scratched but not worn through anywhere. With a heat gun I can shape this in mild complex curves.

Because I want to pedal the thing I'm going to build round a central 40x120 mm aluminium spine, so I'll transfer the offsets onto 5mm PVC sheet cut them out to allow them to slide over this spine, then glue the skin on, and then fill with foam (yes they'll be holes in convenient places to allow the expanding foam a way out so it doesn't pop). This central spine also gives me a place to mount pedals, gear box, drive shaft and seat. So it's less of a sit on top and more of a sit on top of a hollowed out block of foam covered in PVC. Perhaps sit on top was misleading slightly. I guess I should have said Kayak with a big enough cockpit for a seat and pedals.

Wheels? Yes I thought so too, I'm torn between the simplicity of an upturned T shape which I simply plug into a hole in the bottom (à la Hobie Mirages) and the complexity of something which leaps out of the side at the pull of a lever (Yesh Mister Bond). If I went for the latter I was thinking of enclosing these in small floats, the benefit there is that I can deploy them at night and have stability !!

Oh and the whole lot will have a cabin and cockpit made of the same 1mm PVC bent over simple 10 mm PVC tubing which can be detached at any time. This'll give me a place to sleep towards the stern and keep the rain off my head while I pedal (because I live in Brittany and it rains a lot here). To hold this down - velcro.

Voila... not cheap exactly, but cheaper in as much as I've got the tools, the PVC's more available that ply near me, the glue welds the stuff, so it should help avoid leaks, the foam I've got a huge load of left over from some DIY, I don't have to go out and buy a half decent saw because I lent mine to someone who then moved with it - and finally, I used to build Airfix kits as a kid, and this is just one huge Airfix kit.

Now back to Freeship to give you lot piccies you can pick apart (feel free - I need the advice).

 

Expendable boat building

Boat drill, I suppose....

 

Expendable boat building

Careful sir, I'll have you remember that these 'cheese eating surrender monkeys' as you so disdainfully call them are Scotland's 'Auld Alliance...'. Staunch allies who stood with us against the English through....well....through...errr...
Dammit, you're right Alex.
Which reminds me...Do you know why it's unwise to stick your head in a Hartlepool pub and shout 'Who hung the monkey then...?'

 

Asprin?

Quote Bergy, Jack, Poida… Asprin?

Aah, the finest female contraceptive… held tightly between the knees