Stone Fly Canoe * LAUNCHED

Jeff Horton

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The Heart of Dixie
I have been thinking about a skin canoe for a while. I am not a big canoe fan and just prefer a kayak but after some recent fishing trips I started to think a canoe might be better for fishing. More comfortable and it would provide a place inside the boat to put your gear.

So I am about to start building my first Skin on Frame canoe. It is my design. My design goals center around fishing. I want it to be a solo boat, lightweight and to turn 180 degrees with a couple of paddle strokes. I don't want a white water boat with no tracking and the ability to spin on dime. But I don't want it to track like a Sea kayak either. As always I want the styling to be a bit different so it stands out from the other boats. The rest of my goals such as safer and better storage for gear and paddles inside is just typical canoe.

Here is what I have come up with. And, the pink color... it's just the color I prefer on the computer screen in my software. I find it one of the easier colors to work with. I like the contrast and the details show up better than other colors I have tried. I have no idea what color the finished boat with be at this point but most likely not pink.

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Stone Fly will be almost 15 foot long and have a beam of 28" and water line beam of 26.5". It has a stability factor of 98. Of course the seat height will have a big effect on how stable it feels. Resistance numbers are similar to my Curlew design (kayak) and if paddled with a double blade paddle it should be right at home with a group of average paddlers. Best part is I predicting it will weight 28-32 lbs. Basically half a fiberglass boat.

Being my first canoe I expect there will be some issues I have not thought of and these will have to worked out as I go. I finished up the plans and printed them out a little while ago. Hope to start building it this weekend and will of course take lots of photos.
 
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This should be very interesting to watch.

A couple of questions:

1) What was the stability factor on your earlier Kayak? I think there was one that was a little tippy?

2) Is stability ranked from 0-100?

3) As I understand your other designs, you use no mechanical fastners, but rather lash the stringers to the frames. Is that the same way this one will work?

4) Are you going to put some sort of a bottom on the inside of this one?

Looks like a very cool project.
:thumb: :thumb:
 
The answer to most of this is " Shrugs his shoulders and says "I dunno yet". :D I just figure some of this out as I build.

1) What was the stability factor on your earlier Kayak? I think there was one that was a little tippy?

2) Is stability ranked from 0-100?


Stability factor is calculated number that ranges from 40 something upwards. 100 is a boat most anyone would be comfortable with once they are sitting down would be quite stable. When you get into the 60's that a pretty tippy boat and take a good paddler. Below that and you're in Racing territory and I have no idea how they keep them upright! I have one that is is 65 I think (not one of my designs). I can paddle it and it has never dumped me but I am very surprised too.

Most of my boats are low 90's, like 92-93. They would probably be a little spooky to a new paddler at first but within 30 minutes you would adjust to it no problem. But that is about as low as most people would want to go for casual paddling. When you hit the 80's that's getting uncomfortable for most people but your (typically) rewarded with much better speed too.

3) As I understand your other designs, you use no mechanical fastners, but rather lash the stringers to the frames. Is that the same way this one will work?

Probably will lash this one together but I am not sure yet. I have been reading about a glue some boat builders use and it sounds interesting. But if I glue it and decide I need to change something it's a major deal to cut out a frame and replace it. So most likely I will just lash it together.

I am just a little concerned since there is no deck to tie everything together. But there is only one way to find out!

4) Are you going to put some sort of a bottom on the inside of this one?

Yes, if I understand what your asking. I am going to put a partial floor in this one so I have a place for my feet and gear to rest on instead of the skin. I am thinking I will just add a few cedar strips down the middle where my feet rest and run it out just behind the seat. That would give me a place to put tackle box and/or a cooler our of way but within easy reach.

There are a lot of details I have thought about but don't have an answer for yet. I am a visual person and as the boat comes together and I see it, I start to see how I am going to handle the next step. Sometimes I just sit in my chair and look at it till I come up with an idea.
 
Thanks for all the Info Jeff!

Guess I'm just a frustrated boat builder and coveter of canoes. I've owned a couple of canoe books and plans since I moved out of an apartment and bought my first drill press. Built a little sailing dingy, but just haven't gotten around to a canoe, but that doesn't stop me from looking at the craigslist ads for canoes every morning...
 
Looking forward to watching things progress, Jeff. The Stone Fly sure looks good on paper. (Or...LCD screen, or whatever it is I'm looking at.) :thumb:
 
There is a very large and popular Boy Scout canoe race every year on the White River here in our part of the country. Some of the scouts have built Kevlar skin racing canoes. They are nearly transparent and look very flimsy. But (I'm told) they really are very durable. Of course, they weigh almost nothing. A local retired doctor still builds one occasionally.
Getting in one, for the uninitiated, would almost be an act of faith they look so delicate.
BTW, the White River is the name, no white water.
 
I know the White Rivers reputation as a trout stream. Don't think I have ever been there though. We did go to Arkansas when I was kid and did some fishing but I don't remember a lot about it.
 
I know the White Rivers reputation as a trout stream. Don't think I have ever been there though. We did go to Arkansas when I was kid and did some fishing but I don't remember a lot about it.

If you catch one of the near record breaking brownies or rainbows, you will remember, fer certain, fer sure. White River and the feeder North Fork both produce some real submarines.
Y'all come by sometime, ye hear.
 
I thought I had the design ready to start cutting out. As I was studying the full sized plans I printed I got concerned about a couple of areas and decided to make a few minor changes. There is still a lot about the boat to be worked out. I have had some questions about the floors so I thought I would share a little more details on what I am looking at.

This is a section of one of frames in the center of the boat. The green line is the skin and the gold squares are the stringers that run from one end of the boat to the other. The smaller squares along the center are the strips for the floors.

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I created a wire frame model of the hull. This shows the stringers and where the frames will be located. You end up with the frame above the floors. I considered mounting the floors on top of the frames but that would raise the center of gravity a little bit. Granted not a lot, but every little bit helps. And the frames divide the boat in sections. For example I could place a tackle box under the seat and it should stay there. Behind the seat I can put a cooler or milk crate in that section.

wireframe.jpg


The green section is where the seat will be. I placed frames close together so I can just attach the seat to the frames. I think that the this will tie the boat sides together so that I will not need a thwart. Depending on seat height, I might add a thwart behind the seat so I can build in a back rest. One of those things you have to work out as you build on the first one.

The yellow sections are the area that will have the slatted floors. I thought about running it further up but I didn't see a good reason and because of the shapes of the frame it would make it harder to do and I don't plan on carry much with me. Now, time to cut frames.
 
The green section is where the seat will be. I placed frames close together so I can just attach the seat to the frames. I think that the this will tie the boat sides together so that I will not need a thwart.

Any reason you couldn't incorporate the seat support into the seat frames? I.e. the frames where the seat would go would be a fully enclosed shape instead of a "U" like the other open ones? and the seat would just plop right on the support? Just thinking out loud, I guess.
 
Well, that is a thought. But, yes, you could do that but then it is permanent and not movable. (Thinking as I type). So I wouldn't do that on the prototype because I am not sure how high I want the seat or the exact location..... but once the design is finished that could work. Interesting idea I will have to think about some more.

I think I am going to put a traditional woven cane seat in this one.
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Since I am not sure about the location I wanted the option to move it up or down as needed. I want to sit as high as I can for fishing. Being my first canoe I am not sure how high is too high. And I may find I need to move it a little forward or backwards to trim it right.

Once I figure it out, I might just do what you said. That would make is simpler for someone building one and a little cheaper. They could just mount a board on the frames and not have to buy or build a seat.
 
That is what I have in mind Don. This is sort of new water for me having never built a canoe and never paddled one much either. This one is all about comfort while fishing. Hours of sitting and casting abd much less about paddling.

I hope to get back on it this week. Had a paying job that took me off this but that is a good problem to have.
 
I got caught up on orders in the shop so I got back on Stonefly's frames today. The more I look at them the more I convinced they going to have to be remade but more on that latter. I started cutting out the full sized patterns and arranging then gluing them on the the plywood. Then I rough them out with the saber/jig saw.

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I have a mortiser in my shop so I take the rough cut pieces to it and cut the slots for the stringers. You don't need one but if you have one by all means take advantage of it.

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Since I am much better with the bandsaw than the jig saw I prefer to cut the frames on it. I have a lot more hours using it so I am more accurate cutting with it.

Here you can see the frames ready for the edges to be rounded over and sanded.

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Now I have a big concern about the frames. After holding them in my hand I realize they are fragile, or at least feel it. Since there is no deck on the boat the frames with the slots of floor slats flex a lot and I am pretty certain that once I go to put gunwales in place that one of the frames is going to break from the pressure. If I could get the boat together and get a thwart in place and the gunwales blocked out I believe it would work. But I have a lot of concerns at this point.

I can put in temporary braces at each frame while I build it but there is still the chance it will break something once they are removed. That would be a lot of work to loose. Obvious answer is to redesign the frames and make them taller and therefore stronger. But that was something I was trying to avoid. One of the drawbacks of this style of construction is the frame 'dirty' up the inside of the boat.

I guess it's time to sit in the moaning chair and rock for a while and think this one through before I go any further.
 
Jeff
How about some info on how you print your full size patterns. Are they small sheets taped together or do you have a large format printer/plotter? They look real nice!
Thanks
Garry
 
Jeff,
Once you assemble it and install the horzontal "stringers" (for want of a better word) shouldn't that take care of the flex ? :huh::dunno:

That is not the problem. The problem is the frames are going to break when I start to assemble it.

Jeff
How about some info on how you print your full size patterns.

I bought a plotter. Did the small sheets once time and that was enough. Plus I sell full sized plans of my boats and no one wants to tape all those sheets together. :thumb:
 
Could you double up the thickness on those frames you are most concerned about ? Or would that add too much extra weight ? Fiberglass coating to reinforce them ? Just some random thoughts.
 
I tossed around some ideas to salvage what I had, but I want to do it right the first time. This is new ground for me so I expected something like to happen. So I am scraping several of the frames and just starting over.

I 'tested' one and it snapped like a twig, just as I was afraid. Bottom line is they were just a bad design and when that happens you back up and redo it. Far from the first time one of my ideas hasn't worked. :rolleyes:

I spent a few hours on the computer and changed the design of the frames and the floors to something I think will work. I will make the largest frame first and 'test' it before cutting the others. Depending on my work I should start to assemble the frame next week. Then I can start looking for the next problem that is going to jump out of the bushes. ;)
 
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