Author Archives: Kudzu

Up, over and out.

Posted on by
Reply

Book is finished and copies on order. Now I can turn my attention back the Making Waves.  I spent about 3 hours getting the engine disconnected and out of the boat. It feels like a major accomplishment too. It wasn’t hard but just time-consuming. And absolute murder on my knees and that ankle I messed up a while back!

Photos will tell the tell.

Here is free of the boat for probably the first time in 50 years.

About this point I got concerned that it wouldn’t clear the gunwales and I was right.

I had to sit it down. Tight the chain holding the hoist. Tighten the chain holding the motor and with the motor lifted as high as I could get it, it cleared by about 1/8″. That was cutting it too close!

Finally free of the boat. Now to finish stripping the hull and working up a game plan for exactly what I have to do next.

Book is now available for Pre-Sale

Posted on by
Reply

It’s been a long road but the new book will be available shortly. It’s close enough that I am now preselling it on my web site. I am waiting on a second proof copy to arrive but I am confident that if this is not ‘IT’ that the next one will be.

Actually if I hadn’t messed up the cover the first time around it would be in print right now. There is nothing like seeing a printed copy in your hand.

It looks perfect on the computer. Your order a proof expecting on minor changes. You run to the mailbox, it’s here! You rip open the mailer with your first proof, all excited to see it and  then it just jumps in your face and say “ARE YOU BLIND??’

I wasn’t sure how to answer that …..

The new book has five, count them FIVE new boats. Admit it, you buy the book for the free plans. So I gave you a bunch this time. Two rowing boats, a Pirogue, a kids kayak (long over due) and as much as I hate to admit it, a Recreational Kayak.  Yea, yea, I know! You guys love them but I just hate them. But, since I really need your money I caved in. I am so ashamed….

I wish I had kept tract of what day I started the book. I know it was in mid January because that is when I brought Makin’ Waves into the shop to start the restoration. I remember before I could get started on her I decided to write the new book. It’s getting really close to January again and Makin’ Waves is just now being taken apart.

It looks like, by the time the book is printed and makes it to Amazon and my store it will be 10 months. No wonder I am so sick of it!

Now for a bit more advertising. In my new book I have a couple of row boats. One is really just begging for a sliding seat. I finally finished up the plans for my sliding seat rowing unit. Just in time to go with the book. Smart huh?

Not a really good photo but I can’t seem to locate the good ones. But keep it in mind if you need or just want a drop-in sliding seat unit. It is listed in the plans section of the Kudzu Craft Store.

Now I need to go check my bank balance and see if I can hold out till it starts selling.

She is grounded to the ground

Posted on by
Reply

They say a picture is worth a thousand words and I don’t have many today. Words that is. Too tired, so I will let the photos do most of the talking.

Oh, before I forget, I received my info from Mariners Museum on Making Waves. She is as I thought a 1962, 20′ Sportsman. She went to a dealer in Biloxi, Mississippi from the factory. I always suspected it was a Southern Boat but never had the proof. She came with optional canvas top and frame, side curtains and 283 Chris Craft engine.

Lifted off the trailer

Here she is hanging just a couple inches above the trailer. Kind of scary pulling the trailer out ever though I knew everything was plenty strong.

The flying boat

Again, nothing to worry about but scary too.

Stern stand in place

I built a stand for the back of the boat. Spent a lot of time thinking on how to do this. As usual it looks pretty simple but it was a bear to come up with.

A ground!

Here she is, grounded and ready for the serious work to begin.

It went smooth and painless. I know it was because I put a lot of effort and thought into getting to this point. But, I am still left with the feeling “Why did it to so long to get to do this.”

We have lift off

Posted on by
Reply

The boat lifted off the trailer that is. In my last post I mentioned it took me a full day to lift the boat off the trailer just an inch or so, I knew I had to have a better way. After much contemplation and racking of the brain, I finally settled on pair of gantries.

While this was a great idea, it turned out it was going to cost a fortune!! I needed 4 hoists and 8 industrial casters and neither of these are cheap. Plus I needed lumber too.

I priced chain hosts first. At least $125 each and I need 4. Casters are at least $40 plus and I need 8 of those. That is $820 plus and that doesn’t count shipping. That could buy a lot of mahogany!

Well, never doubt the power of prayer. I found all the above for a little over $300 and scrounging around my barn I found all but 2 pieces of lumber for the 2 gantry frames. All I can do is say Thank you Lord!

I pulled the boat out of the shop late in the evening to make room to build the gantries. The next morning I started to gather all the parts and lay them out in the shop. The Weatherman was calling for a nice day but storms that night so I had to get these built today and the boat back inside. I knew that once I got started it wouldn’t take that long. But handling all those heavy pieces made for one LONG day.

I added another item to my “I will never do that again” list. Trying to stand up a gantry by myself. While I did it, it took more than one attempt and there was some collateral damage the first attempt. But we are not going to talk about that.

If you look close you can see the second gantry is built and upright minus the wheels. The second one, with wheels installed is standing upright too. Wheels can turn a simple one man job into a bloody nightmare! But being the kind of person to learn from his mistakes, I laid the second gantry down, finished assembling it and waited till help showed up before I tried to stand it up. Of course the fact I was teetering on the edge of exhaustion probably had something to do with that choice too. But about 7 pm it was done and boat was safely back in the shop.

Jumping ahead a couple of days my new strap, not straps, came in. Being the patient person I did take the time to read the invoice and find out why I only had one strap when I had order two. It seems they only had one in stock in Atlanta and the other one was coming from the warehouse somewhere up North in Yankee land. With my luck, it will take a week to clear customs at the Mason-Dixon line.

I wanted to see what happened to the gantries when I put a load on them. I hung two chain hoists, pulled the strap under the boat and tried to lift the back of the boat.

Exciting photos huh? Even though you can’t see it, the boat is just clear of the bunks on the trailer and I can see day light between them. Lifting the boat was almost effortless. I measured the gantry to see if was trying do the splits but found it had just barely moved.

One thing I see I need to change is the braces at the top. Now that I see everything in place I see a better way to brace it. I can give the hoists more clearance and spread the load out more.

While I wait on the second strap I am going to leave it hanging on the hoists. I will measure it before and after I take the load off the boat and see what if anything moves. Assuming no surprises, it won’t be long before I can start getting serious about tearing it apart.

Making Waves * Take Two

Posted on by
Reply

Back a while ago I said I was starting on the restoration of Making Waves. Well, that changed about as quick as it started. God had other ideas and instead I have been writing my the new book. With the book nearing completion I have some time to actually start on this project.

The first big step was to start removing her ‘furniture’ and see exactly what I have to deal with.

Inside

Event though it has been covered while it was stored it is still amazing at the amount of dirt and trash inside. It was more amazing at all the ‘things’ that ended up in the bilge too! In the photo I can see a flip flop, ski glove, and cup. Trust me I have pulled a lot more than that our all ready!

seats out

floors out

Earlier I found a Bumble Bee nest in the bow. The drain plug is in the bow and had been left open so if water got in it could drain out of the boat. Great idea but it seems the Bee’s found this opening inviting and built a nest under the floor boards! Their nest was keeping the area damp and now we have rot to deal with where the nest was.

Next big problem is that the boat was not sitting on the trailer properly and that has led to a deformation of the hull and some broken ribs. There is one area where the planking will have to be replaced for sure on the hull. I expect there is more that will show up as I get into it.

Bilge will have to be painted, that zinc chromate green has to go! Who thought that was a good idea??

Earlier this week my project was spending a full day jacking up the boat and getting it centered and back down on the trailer. This was a harder task than I had expected. Since I have a lot of work to do on the bottom of the boat, I see I need a better way to lift and shore it.

After all the effort to get the boat off the trailer I have decided that the only real option is build a gantry and use chain hoists. So this weeks project to built two gantries and find some chain hoists. Then the real work can begin.

Eli Whitney Museum kids programs

Posted on by

I feel like a proud father! I received this email along with the attached photos today. Love seeing kids getting involved in boating, especially boat building, at an early age.

Jeff , This summer at the Eli Whitney Museum we built 10 – !2′ kayaks, with kids 12 to 14 years old, based on your Free B 12 design. I supplied kits comprised of 1/2″ MDO frames, keels marked for frame location, stringers,combing parts, sinew and skin. Frame assembly and skinning took five days. Applying finish, combing, seats, paddles, etc, took another four and a half days, leaving a half day to play. The boats,as you can see from the photos sat nicely on the water, tracked well and were handy enough for kids to negotiate the creek behind my shop. I have gotten lots of great feedback about how much the kids are enjoying showing off and using their boats. We have been building boats here for about 12 years and these boats seem to be getting much more use than any design previously built. I believe there is an inverse relationship between how much a boat weighs and how much it gets used. Parents were so taken with the boat we are offering an adult class this winter. we will be build a 14′ 6” boat similar to your Free B 14. I would like to thank your book and videos which made this project possible. Your generous sharing of your Free B designs and reasonable prices on materials are greatly appreciated at a non-profit such as ours. I look forward to doing business with you again. Happy paddling

Mike Dunn

The photos are what made it for me. So I have included all that Mike Sent.
I am still grinning!!

More Fuselage Frame boats

Posted on by

For the two or three of you that follow my blog I have been wanting to post something, but I promised myself not to post unless it was worth reading. No one wants to read the random thoughts that run through my head. If it wasn’t for the funny voices they use, I wouldn’t want to hear them.

So, I have waited till I had something worth posting and that is that my new book is written! Notice, I didn’t say it was finished? All the words are now on paper, actually they are just a series of 1’s and 0’s on a couple of computer hard drives. But, it is out of my head and on paper…. so to speak.

I am not sure if a book is ever really finished. After working on this one for several months I am now convinced that writers just get to the point they give up and say “It is finished”. If they are smart they give up and get a real job. They have to do one of other or they end up with a vacation in the Loony Bin.

Me? I gave up! A copy is now in the hands of my new Editor, Vaughn. He is currently being tormented by my thought process, trying to make it coherent for you guys and gals (have to be politically correct there). After editing my first book my previous editor now works as a baby sitter, that should tell you something. So, you guys will owe Vaughn a BIG thank you! You can probably thank him next month at the drive-thru window.

While Vaughn pulls his hair out, I have some free time on my hands. I worked on the cover and this is what I came up with. Not to shabby, huh?

As usual, I have changed it some since I saved this image. Actually, I have changed it several times since then. I will probably change it several more before I ‘give up’. It will probably look totally different than this by the time it hits the store shelves. Maybe you should just ignore this.

And speaking of hitting the stores; More Fuselage Frame Boats will be available on Amazon late this Fall, just in time for Christmas! (hint, hint!) And of course I will be selling autographed copies on my web site in the store. I am sure my signature makes it worth at least double what I will charge.

So what is in the book that makes is worth buying? FREE PLANS! If I can’t get you cheapskates to buy my full size plans, maybe I can entice you to buy the book if I include a few for free. 😉

In the book you will find a Pirogue named Crawfish. It is a two man boat. Excuse me, two woman, or a man and a woman or….. Two people can fit in it.

There are a couple of rowing boats, Flyfisher and Matilda. Yes rowing boats! They even have varnished transoms, something you have probably never seen on a skin boat before.

I had to include a couple of kayaks so I included the Mess About 12, a short, fat recreational kayak that are so popular. Why I don’t know! But if it makes you buy the book… 😉

Since your kids want to go kayaking too, I now have a kids kayak, Tadpole. Say thanks to Phil for the name, I think it is perfect! Tadpole has a strong Greenland style just liked Mom and Dads boat but it in a smaller package.

So, now you are up to date! With the cooler weather maybe I will get paddling photos soon.

Paddle #2

Posted on by

Just got in from a 5 minute paddle and learned a lot more.

Raising the oars 2″ made a dramatic difference. No bloody knees! Plenty of clearance and did not bang my knees once. So that was a huge improvement and one issue resolved.  I had searched and searched the web but could never find any recomendation on this height so I guessed and guessed wrong. But now I have a good starting point from now on.

As a side note I am thinking I made this boat to low. It should have been at least an inch taller and maybe even two. I don’t want to get caught out in rough water in this thing. Maybe with some experience it will OK but that leads to the other issue, stability…..

There is more to stability than just keeping a boat upright. I have no problems there, I can sit in the boat with or without oars no problem. It’s tender but I guess from paddling lower stability kayaks is why I don’t find it a big problem. Phil however struggled with the stability which sort of surprised me.

https://www.facebook…469379416407085

But today, since I wasn’t focused on keeping my knees out of the way I started to confront the next issue. I keep dipping one oar in the water which could be a really bad thing at higher speed. Right now it is just a major annoyance and frustrates the heck out of me!!!! I was assuming it was just me letting one side droop and hit the water. But being able to focus on this, I realize that was not the case.

I am wobbling as I paddle, leaning the boat to one side or the other and with the lenght of the oars it doesn’t take much for an oar to dip into the water. So it is a stability issue, not turning over but rocking from side to side. That will improve with experience I am sure but since I can’t paddle worth a darn now I am going to try to lower the seating position.

I tried sitting on top of the seat frame (very uncomfortable!!) with the sliding seat all the way back but that made a big difference. It would not be very hard to add a board across the frame to use as a fixed seat. That will lower me an inch and half and that will make a marked difference. And it’s easier than making a new frame. So I will probably start with that.

Stay tuned!

To the water we go!

Posted on by

I finished the boat and took it to the water. I have a small leak at the transom, no idea where but that’s fairly easy to fix (I hope). I got on the water and found the stability about what I expected. It’s definitely tender, but not as bad as I was afraid it would be. A newbie or someone who hasn’t paddled lower stability boats would not be comfortable in it.

Phil came along for the laughs I provided. He was kind enough to snap photos too. I had tried the boat with no oars and now I was headed to the boat for the first try.

First stroke trying to get away from the shore. Note to self: Turn the boat toward open water!! I really struggled to get going.

This photo is just to show I did make it on the water and actually row it a little. But it was a study in frustration! Rowing is not easy. There is a rhythm and timing between oars, arms and legs and I didn’t have it together. But I am sure that comes with time.

Another big issue was I found the outrigger were not high enough. When I lifted the oars out of the water, I kept hitting my knees. If I didn’t hit my knees I drug the oar in the water and that is a BAD thing! Part of that was my timing, I kept lifting my knees to quickly, but a large part was the oars were just too low and I have the scars on top of my leg to prove it!

So, I have rigged up some temporary blocks to raise the oars locks and clamped them in place with some clamps. I want to take it to the water to see how much difference this makes and assuming no bloody knee caps I will figure the best way to raise them up.

 

The fix is in!

Posted on by

I kept pondering on this and really want to try to fix the rower frame. I knew that just gluing it together would not work. The thoughts of having to chisel out the dados to  replace the broken cross piece was not appealing, at all.

Then I had the thought, I could add a cross piece making the cross brace into a T shape. That would make the whole frame much stronger I couldn’t just glue it on top because thew wood was oiled and glue wouldn’t stick. Secondly it would be in the way for the sliding seat  hardware so I need to mill a dado and cut down the broken piece too.

Thinking on how I was going to this I leaned toward making a router jig, but I kept thinking how much faster a dado stack on the table saw would be. Problem was, I was certain it wouldn’t fit on the table.

I was right, it wouldn’t fit but I discovered if I removed the left side extension on the table it would. It was going hit the fence rail at the back but there was just enough space to finish the cut. So I removed the extension. Clamped some scrap the miter gauge and clamped the broken frame together so it couldn’t move.

I am not quite finished with the cut in this photo. I cut it  1-1/2″ wide and centered on the cross brace. By doing this I cut off the top of the broken brace that was oiled. Now I have clean wood across the top to glue too.

I decided I had better add a second piece further back to help prevent any racking. When I slid it over to make the cut it really wanted to tip over without the extension table in place. I didn’t want to replace extension just yet so I grabbed one of the big cast iron clamps and placed it on the end as a counterweight to help balance it. Then I clamped it to the miter gauge and that worked.

Here is the finished unit. It’s now much stronger. I have installed heel cups, added a temporary foot strap (I think I want some wider webbing) and installed the rails and seat.

Here she is, all finished as far as I can tell. All I need to do is check the transom to make sure it is water tight. I don’t expect a problem but I would rather find it now.  If there are no surprises then she is ready for the water.

We are in the middle of a heat wave so I am not sure when I will be on the water. I have been working on the rowing machine at the gym and I know that rowing can be a strenuous workout, so I may have to go by myself early one morning.