It appears the hard part of building the canoe is done! I put 2 layers of 4 oz cloth on the ama, cut the iakos to fit, and rigged up the rudder and pedals. We went to the canal to make sure the rig was right, and Kaile took off! She paddled under the bridge and wanted to go out in the “real ocean”. She wanted to paddle to flat island, but I didn’t have any way to go with her so we went home to get my SUP. We walked to Lanipo and were going to just paddle to Rella’s to play… When we got there, Pete said Rella and Jen had paddled to the Mokes, so Kai said “let’s go”. SHE PADDLED ALL THE WAY TO THE MOKES ON HER FIRST DAY OUT!!! I can’t even believe how well she did. This kid’s going to be unstoppable. OC-1 to the Mokes and back at just 5 years old!

Next steps on the canoe are fill the weave on the ama, paint, and make a seat. Almost pau… Here are a bunch of pics from her trip. Sorry they are so blurry. There was a bubble in the dry bag…

Aloha,
Eric

Just to satisfy my curiosity, I tried the fit of my Pueo iakos… Wow! They fit! If only I could get a set for cheap… Check the pics below to see how the major pieces fit together. It’s starting to look like an outrigger!

Kaile Kanu with Pueo iakos

KaileKanu 2

Kaile Kanu 3

Well, we have (or had…) this old one man… About 5 years ago, I “won” it in a Lanikai silent auction for about $120. I fixed it up and used it a few times, but it was 25′ long and weighed about 50# – not exactly a Ferrari. Needless to say, I never really used it much. It just sat around, sad and neglected. I was feeling kind of guilty about the condition it was in… As you can see below, Kaile sort of “claimed” it a while back. I figured that one day, I could give it to her. Well, it appears that that day is now. Now how to make the huge canoe suitable for a little paddler?…

Bixler Horizon

The canoe is long, but it’s also very skinny. My idea was to cut about 10′ out of the middle, and glass the ends back together – leaving a short little “Keiki Kanu”. Because it’s so narrow, the scale works out really well. It took a LONG time to finally get the courage to take the plunge, but a few months ago I jumped in head first, skill saw in hand. I cut about 7′ off each end, then sliced off the deck. Then, I epoxied the ends together. This left me with a shell for the hull.

Once I had a shell for the hull, I needed a new deck. I made bulkheads out of 1″ foam, and then cut a deck out of 2″ foam. I epoxied the deck to the top of the bulkheads and sides of the canoe. There are holes for water to get out at the bottom of the bulkheads, and along the top of each side of the bulkheads. With the deck in place, I used a shureform to round it out and make a “canoe-like” shape. I left the center of the canoe open, to put in a foot well and recess for a seat. This was the “challenging” part of the project. I used the 1″ foam and shureform to shape pieces that I epoxied together to finish out the deck.

When I glued in the sides of the seat well, I made channels to run the rudder cable tubing through. I just took the cable and tubing from the old canoe and reused it…

Speaking of rudder, I needed to make a new rudder that fit the smaller canoe… I cut the shaft out of the old rudder, and shaped a new one out of 1/4″ divinicell. I coated it with epoxy and glass, sanded it, and painted it. Bam! New custom rudder.

What about the other end of the rudder cable, you might ask? Well, I had some carbon fiber cloth left over from the last steering blade I made, so I decided to make a sleek set of carbon pedals. Now, I just need to get some stainless hinges…

The next big task was creating something to attach the iakos to. The boys at Kamanu gave me some left over carbon tubing that they used for the Pueo. I cut some channels into the foam deck and glued in the tubing. When I glass the deck, I’ll glass over the tubing, connecting it to the rest of the deck in one solid piece.

Now that the hull was just about ready to glass, I needed to come up with an ama. I took some of the 1″ foam, and laminated 3 pieces together to make a 3″ wide by about 5′ long chunk of foam to shape the ama out of. I used the Pueo ama as a guide, and used a hack saw and shureform to rough out a mini ama. I think it came out pretty well. Now, I need to put in some carbon tubing to accept the iakos, and glass the whole thing…

Well, that’s it. A bunch of pieces waiting for assembly. I need to do some final sanding and a bunch of glassing… The last “parts” I need to acquire are the iakos and a seat. Getting closer! I’ll post some more once I get some more work done.

Aloha,
Eric

Download this episode or watch on your phone. | Duration: 00:39

Kaile was a trooper and didn’t even complain much when she got cold, Dan was the man and held down the ama every time we were on a port tack, and Roxy paddled it like she stole it! We went from Lanikai, to Smith point, to the Mokes, around Flat Island, and back.

The music is “The Ocean” by Barefoot Truth. Roxy found it on iodapromo, and used it on her last episode of Beach Walks. I liked it so much, I used it here…

What a life! Aloha.

Eric, Mike, and Kaile

Cool effect.

Timeless

On to the repairs… Fixing the mast step turned out to be relatively simple. The mast step base popped off because I hadn’t really attached it very well… I wanted to be sure I could remove it if things didn’t line up properly. Placement was good, and it was seeming to hold just fine, so I pushed it a little too hard… The actual base, is merely a PVC end cap affixed to the deck. Originally, I just scuffed it up and glued it down with 5-min epoxy… Not so strong. This time, I drilled a hole in the middle of it (to fill with epoxy), and also glassed around the base and up the sides with a couple layers of glass, matting and epoxy resin. The additional glassing should prevent any future “popping off”…

Mast step base glassed in

Note the hole and the flange of glass around the cup.

While I had a batch of epoxy mixed up, I went ahead and reinforced the cracked mast step. Jay said he’s going to hook me up with a good one (ie. professionally done by an expert – not crooked, off center, and kinda gooned up like mine…), but I figured I would try and repair this one, too, since I had the epoxy and glass available…

This piece straps to the front wai (cross brace) above the base cup.

Another view. I did the repair out on the beach by the boat...

While I was taking pics of my handiwork, I thought I’d snap a couple pictures of the paddles I made…

My steering blades

The first one I made was the wood one. The shaft is made of tiger wood (VERY dense and HEAVY) I had left over from a deck railing project, and the blade is made of monkey pod I had laying around in the garage. This paddle was a lot of work to shape (by hand with a bench plane and a spoke shave…), and I think it came out really well. It’s VERY heavy, but it’s also VERY effective.

Wooden blade

The second one I made was the carbon fiber one. The shaft is actually the top of an old carbon windsurfer mast, and the blade is shaped from 3/8″ foam with 3 layers of 5-6oz carbon fiber on each side. I made the “T” top out of a scrap piece of mango wood I had in the garage. The blade itself is HUGE. It’s 13 1/2 inches wide at the widest point, and almost 27″ tall. If you notice in the pictures at the top, I don’t even have it all the way in the water to steer. When it’s windier, or while I’m surfing, I can drop it lower for more effectiveness, and effectiveness is something it’s definitely not lacking. I think I could steer the Titanic with that thing!

Here is the blade

Here is the T top

Next weekend we will be in Waikiki, but the following weekend, I hope to get back out sailing. The goal is to put a GoPro on the top of the mast and film from above…

A hui hoe.

There she is! Holole’a with a sail (I finished the polas, mast step, and a GIANT carbon fiber steering blade last week). It was a beautiful day and Kai and I had a great time (Stace was at an OC-6 regatta in Waimanalo)! The only problem with the rig, is that I broke it… I guess the epoxy didn’t bond well enough to the PVC, and the cup at the bottom of the mast step popped off. Not a big deal, except I tried to paddle in without dropping the sail and cracked the mast step, too… Hopefully Jay can help me either repair it or make a new one…

Despite breaking the mast step, Kai and I still had a great day. We rode our bike to the boat and set it up, then went swimming while we waited for my friend Mike. As you can see below, the mast step makes a good umbrella stand…

Anyone for lunch?

Mike came out with us for the “shake down” run, and everything worked great! He couldn’t stay long, so when he left, Kai and I took the sail down and paddled out for a swim.

Monkey on the ama

After swimming for a while we were hungry, so we put the sail back on and sailed down to Kalapawai. The boat was really fast with just the two of us (and the wind was coming up a little).

Daddy and Kai on the way to Kalapawai

I took a quick clip with the Pentax… It’s really shaky, but hey, I was steering with a paddle, working the main sheet, and trying to film all at the same time… I didn’t do any editing, as I only have 20 seconds of video… … and, I’m lazy!

We made it to the beach by Kalapawai in record time. Kai had mac and cheese, and I had a “beach burger”. Tasty. After we ate, we were getting ready to sail back… The wind had come up a little more, and I was worried about sailing back without a safety ama (we would be on a port tack all the way back to Lanikai without an “ama mama” to hold the ama down). I was going to just paddle us, but with all the attention the boat drew, we ended up with an “ama mama” volunteer. Spectacular! AJ threw on her rash guard, and we were off! Unfortunately, we didn’t get far before we heard a CRACK! I knew right away what had popped. Crappy epoxy… Not a big deal, we could just paddle back. We cruised back to the beach to let AJ off (cracked the step enroute…), dropped the sail, and paddled back. While we were putting the boat away, Dan stopped in to say hi. He was a huge help, and took the paddles and the mast step home for me. Made the bike ride home much easier! Thanks, Dan! Dan actually came out and paddled with me yesterday. We had a blast and caught a couple waves at flat island while Stace was at practice. When Stace finished practice, Dan took some great pictures of us. This one is my favorite.

Stace and Eric head to the Mokes

Kai was still with Aunty Rox, who took her on an AWESOME overnight trip to Waikiki. She and Rox lived it up! It was a “trip” Kai will never forget. Without Kai, Stace and I dropped into a couple “bombs” at “Channels”… The new paddle works GREAT! I hope you enjoyed the pixs!

Aloha!

Up and riding!

Below is a picture of her Skuut. It’s a wooden bike without any pedals. It taught her to balance on her first day riding. Two weeks later, she was ready to ride her bike…

Kaile on her Skuut with Auntie Rox and Lexie.