Are there advantages to adding a keel to your canoe, or are keels just a drag? We asked the designer of our plans, Steve Killing, to weigh in on the subject.
"When I started planning out my canoe build, I thought a lot about how I would fabricate the station molds. Should I use try my luck at cutting them out by hand using my bandsaw, or should I get a CNC to do it?" Christian Delbaere explains how he built his own CNC machine using mostly 3D-printed parts in order to cut his station molds.
Almost by chance, Phil Winch came across several partially completed kayaks. He took the unfinished boats into his workshop, and now has a trio of beautiful wooden craft.
Photos of Steve Shergold's Ranger 15 attracted a lot of attention when we shared them on social media. The canoe itself looked great, but a lot praise was due to his clever additions, like a custom dog basket and wannigan that folds into a picnic table. We asked Steve if he might share the story of how he approached his build, and he generously replied with this detailed account.
Kayakcraft contains detailed advice and instructions on how to make your own planking - we've digitized that section for the benefit of builders who're curious about choosing wood, the machining process, joining short planks, and more. These steps are equally applicable to canoes, kayaks, and small boats.
In Part III of the Composite Canoe Building series, Randy Pfeifer succeeds in building his lightest canoe yet. See his process, the materials he used, and final thoughts in this concluding post.
In Part 1 of this series, Randy's first canoe off the mold was unexpectedly heavy. With his second attempt, he begins the process of shaving some weight from a Freedom 17 built using composite materials.
A few months ago, a beautifully printed book showed up in the Bear Mountain mailbox. It was a photo essay on the building of a Champlain canoe by Keith Mathieson, as chronicled by Nicki Endt. It was an unusual story and a beautiful canoe, and Keith and Nicki kindly agreed to let us share a part of it here.
Randy Pfeifer maintains the Bear Mountain Boats Builders' Forum and is highly knowledgeable on the subject of woodstrip epoxy canoes. In this series, he documents his experiments building multiple canoes using composite materials, with the goal of creating a lightweight but fully functional Freedom 17.
It must have been twenty-five years ago I sat on a park bench in Argyll, Scotland, staring in wonder at a woodstrip canoe, upside down on top of a Volvo roof rack. Every bloke that walked passed ran his hands along it – it was a visual and tactile sight to behold. I vowed to make one someday.
Regardless of what you know about kayaks at the moment, the kayak you build should be the right one for you. It will be your mental image of pointing that beautiful varnished deck out into the waters of your favourite place that will keep the project going.
One does not have to be a naval architect to understand the basic principles of canoe design. They are relatively simple, yet vitally important – especially to the builder. The curves of a well-designed canoe are its calling card – a proclamation of the kind of paddling it does best.
