Friday, December 14, 2007
12/14/2007 01:36:00 PM

She Floats

posted by FH2o

She floats and she's beautiful - wood strip kayak designed and built by clever Kuching kayaker Dennis Leong

Dennis’s father picked up one of our flyers and passed it to him and he called me up one evening inquiring if he could join in one of our kayaking trips using his own kayak. “Sure!” As I’m glad to meet another kayaker in Kuching. So I asked him what make of kayak he has and he replied that he’s building his own! Needless to say I asked him if I could have a look and I sped to his house to meet him and have a look at his home built kayak. My jaws dropped as it was a most beautiful wood strip hand built kayak that I’d ever seen. Actually it was the first wood strip hand built sea kayak that I'd ever seen! It was all completed just awaiting the final few finishing coats. If Huey sees this - I bet tears will be rolling down his face! It was simply beautiful.

Maiden paddle - Dennis in his own designed and built sea kayak on Sarawak River, Kuching

When Dennis took her (christen 'Rilo Fun') out for a maiden paddle a few weeks back; I was away and this morning I received an email from him with these 2 photos and these 2 simple and beautiful words – “she floats.”

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  At Friday, 14 December, 2007 Blogger The Moody Minstrel said:

That is beautiful!!! Talk about the Wisdom of the Wood!

I imagine it must be pretty heavy compared with the fiberglass kayaks, though, isn't it?

  At Saturday, 15 December, 2007 Anonymous The builder said:

Weight for weight, wood is stiffer than steel. My wooden kayak is lighter than my polyethylene.
Studies have shown wood to be up to 10 times stiffer than fiberglass by weight and nearly 6 times stiffer than a composite of Kevlar and epoxy.

The disadvantage of a wooden kayak is the construction time and the skill required to built one.

  At Sunday, 23 December, 2007 Blogger fullmoon said:

beautiful kayak ! Every paddler's dream to build and paddle their own kayak. And wood gives that special warm feeling..

  At Sunday, 23 December, 2007 Blogger FH2o said:

mm - Dennis have answered this himself!

the builder - Thanks for the photos and the clarifications to MM. Yeah, wood is magic and you have crafted out such a beautiful and magical kayak.

fullmoon - The next time you're here, I'll bring you over to Dennis's place so that you can ogle and drool over it to your heart's content! But I wonder if he'll let us paddle if? ;)


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