Boat Design | Cape Falcon Kayak

Timelapse: Skinning the pedal drive canoe prototype

June 2023July 2024Leave a comment

Sound on! I put the skin on the pedal drive canoe yesterday, and shot a few updates for our online skin-on-frame canoe building course. This time I ended up using my buddies Grex pneumatic stapler, which was much easier on the hands than the good old Stanley T50. Skinning canoes is always nice because...

Installing the pedal drive base plate

June 2023July 2024Leave a comment

Today I took the plunge and install the base plate for the pedal drive. After 20 years of managing to avoid the stuff, I’m still feeling pretty indignant about all the epoxy work in this new modification. Unfortunately I just don’t see any way around it. On the positive side, I think there’s a...

Finally a bit more progress on the pedal power canoe

May 2023June 2023Leave a comment

Finally a bit more progress on the pedal power canoe. I spent the last week measuring and testing the seating geometry of every pedal drive kayak I could get my hands on. Next I made a final decision on drive location, which was pretty brutal and amounts to nothing more than a coin toss,...

Chewing on seat geometry

May 2023June 2023Leave a comment

Been away from the shop for a couple days, but I’m back on the pedal powered canoe project and chewing pretty hard on the seating geometry. My starting point for this is the standard seating geometry from a Hobie mirage because they absolutely nailed the comfort in that boat which is much harder to...

Video: a scrap wood prototype of the pedal drive box

April 2023July 2023Leave a comment

Today I built a scrap wood prototype of the drive box to adapt the Hobie Mirage Drive to my skin on frame canoes. The first drive is a knock off of Hobie’s first generation Mirage drive called a Freedom Drive which retails for $325 and the second is Hobie’s current Mirage Drive 180 for...

Testing boats and checking symmetry for the pedal drive adaptation

April 2023June 2023Leave a comment

Today was a little bit of on the water testing, and a lot of frowning while chewing on details. Because I’m using the Mirage drive it made sense to actually try one before I install it, so I met a friend down at the dock to take a spin in his Hobie for a...

Video: A quick peek at the new 225 lb size LPB

April 2023June 2023Leave a comment

Not great filming but here’s a quick peek at the new 225 pound size LPB kayak on the water with a 225lb person (thanks Jim). This kayak is 17 feet long and 23 inches wide and weighs 36lbs fully rigged. Jim was a bit wobbly due to not being on the water for a...

Video: Float testing an older F1

April 2023June 2023Leave a comment

We took a moment yesterday to float test this older 187 lb size F1. The frame for this kayak was originally built for a customer that I decided to put in a different size, then sat in storage for a couple years. Last week I got an email from someone that it seemed like...

First test of the new 250 lb size F1

March 2023June 2023Leave a comment

We had an extremely successful wrap test of the new 250 pound size F1 frame. This version is 15‘8“ long and 25 inches wide (but paddles like it’s 23 because of my hull shape) and the paddler is 6’5” 265 lbs. The extra 15 pounds is useful because it shows me what this kayak...

Saran wrap testing the new 230lb size LPB kayak

March 2023June 2023Leave a comment

Took the new 230lb size LPB kayak frame down to the water for some shrink wrap testing. I couldn’t get my hands on an appropriately sized paddler for the test so we had to rely on Tom plus some water bags for weight. This is a little risky because there’s no guarantee that the...

The 230 lb LPB is coming together

March 2023June 2023Leave a comment

I am extremely happy with how the new 230 pound size LPB frame has come together. This version is 23 1/4 inches wide and 17 feet long, although just like all LPB’s it is 1 inch narrower where you actually take the stroke, and that combined with the flared hull makes it functionally equivalent...

Scaling for the new prototype 230lb LPB

March 2023June 2023Leave a comment

Just finished the scaling for the new prototype 230lb LPB kayak size. I’m not exactly good at math (or thinking) and it’s not as simple as just multiplying all of the measurements by a ratio, so this is always a bit stressful. This time we are going for an exact proportional scale which is...

And here we go again…

March 2023June 2023Leave a comment

And here we go again… while I wait for a nice day to do a saran wrap test on the 250 pound size F1 prototype frame I’m switching gears and diving into a redesign on the larger sizes of my LPB design, starting with the 225 lb size which is currently 16’-3” long and...

More next steps in the big person kayak evolution

February 2023June 2023Leave a comment

I’m having trouble deciding on the next steps in the big person kayak evolution. I was going to build another 275 pound version, but this time an exact proportional scale of the F1, as opposed to my slightly modified scale that we tested last week. But after seeing the layout for that turn my...

What’s next for the big guy/gal kayak design

February 2023June 2023Leave a comment

For everyone who is following this project, I want to take a moment to talk about what’s next for the big guy/gal kayak design. I’m happy enough with the trim and the volume for the intended paddler weight of 275lbs that I’m considering putting out a beta version for anyone who wants to be...