JEM Watercraft

Top fish is a yellow fin fream, very popular sport fish on light tackle.

Bottom one is a dusky flathead.

Both species are very good to eat with firm, sweet, white flesh and are eagerly sought after right round our coastline. Both will take hard bofy lures, soft plastics, fly or live oor dead bait and they are recognized here with ANSA status, (Australian National Sportfishing Association) It takes a fish with significant fighting ability to qualify. They also just happen to be a lot of fun to catch. Their feeding habits make them ideal for targeting from a paddle craft.

Great progress. My long overdue target date for hitting the water is in about 2 weeks. If I'm lucky I can at least one coat of varnish on it by Oct. 10th.

pigue3one:
I live in Weimar about an hour from you on IH10, maybe we can get together some week end and float the colorado

I was reading a thread over on the southern paddler board that mentioned that you should let the resin cure for about 30 days before varnishing. You seem to have most of your yak glassed so that might not be an issue for you. I am way past my estimated completion date, but life happens.

jhegar, sure. That is if I ever git'er done!

Interesting week in boat building. I found the simplest way to cut off the feet of my cockpit frame. Just stick it in your ceiling fan. No kidding. I forgot about the ceiling fan on my patio and chopped the things clean off, about 3 inches too short though. I'll find a way to reinforce the forward 2 inches.

I finally got the exterior of the hull glued up. I had to flip the boat over a couple of times to do the bow and stern. I was thinking about how to mount the rudder when I build one, then realized that I had already built the mount. I just cut a chunk off of the stern forming jig and glued it in.

I had to flip and tack the bow and stern from the inside

With the same batch of glue I filled all the gaps on the rest of the hull. When that dried I pulled the jigs and finished glueing the bow and stern.


When building a boat outdoors in houston this is the most important tool:



I can't decide if I want to build a rudder or a retractable skeg, but here is where I'll mount it:


Tomorrow I'll put on a couple of graphics and glass the hull.

Before permanently attaching the T/W, C/P and decks, think about how you would install a rudder, rudder cables etc. I got a little ahead of my self and had to rely on some Cajun Engineering to work it out - Run up to Kingwood this weekend if you get a chance - MK

This is why I am considering a retractable skeg. From what I've read and heard, a rudder's most useful aspect is that it helps steer in a straight line. I don't think I would have much trouble turning with my paddle.

Also, one of the original goals in building kayak, was to do it on the cheap. Yet, as I progress in this project, I keep coming up with new toys/plans. The more I do this, the further away I get from completion, and my original price estimate.

I have missed way too much fishing, lately.

Weekends are tough for me. I am a bar manager and my weekend falls on Monday/Tuesday. I work until 4 am on Friday and Saturday. Weekend plans can be made, but require an act of congress.

I installed a retractable skeg on my Arctic Tern using the other design. I put it in before glueing the deck to the hull. The only thing I would have done differently would be to make the skeg removable. It rotates on a 3/8 stainless steel rod. The Arctic Tern tracks so well, I can barely tell the difference. Don't worry, I'll run into you somewhere - MK

I finally got it all put together and put two coats of epoxy over everything. My lines weren't as pretty as Dangermouse's, in fact things didn't line up very well at all. I had to use some serious marine corps ingenuity and force just to twist and hold the hull in such a way that I could get it tack welded together. As a result I had to use a lot of fairing compound on some of the joints and sanded to bare wood on the last strips glued in above the tank well and cockpit.

Ergo, I decided to paint the boat to cover up my mistakes. I chose a two part polyurethane from Epifanes.

These pics are after 1 coat. Man this is shiny stuff.



Then two coats of graphite/epoxy mix on the bottom.



How many coats of the graphite should I put on the bottom?