Building the VARDO * SOF kayak

[Kudzu]

So you said you would be interested in seeing a SOF built so here you go. This is my latest design Vardo. Click here for more info on it. Assuming this boat has no surprises or disappointments me, my plan is to offer it as a kit. So this is the prototype and will help me determine any changes needed.

Obviously the first part was the design of the boat. I will skip that part and just say I have been working on the boat design off and on for a three months.



Once the design was finalized I created a set of offsets for the frames and draw them out on some cardboard. I don't draw out the actual frame, just the the critical points so I can visualize the frames better. This is surprising harder than you think. So it's better to mess up on paper and regardless how careful I am I always do.



I take the cardboard sketches and layout the frames on some cheap plywood. Even after doing this many times it's still slow and so easy to make a mistake. it takes me a while to do this. Much of this is just done by eye and experience as I go.



Once the frames are laid out I usually cut them in smaller pieces and take them to the bandsaw. I can do a much better job with the band saw than the jig saw. So I rough all these out and make the final cuts there.



At the end of the day I have the outsides cut pretty close to size. I will go back and sand these and do some work with the rasp also. Still a good bit of work to have the outsides finished before they are finished.



Tomorrow I start cutting the insides of the frames.

Jeff

[wysedav]

Looks good, I'm sure you'll be done in a couple of days!! Keep it coming I'm watching.

David

[Kudzu]

DAY 3

I didn't work on the boat yesterday. By the time I got the little bit of work I had done I just didn't feel good. Sinuses were bothering me so I just worked on some new boat ideas on the computer.

This morning I headed out to check out a new wood supplier I meet at the boat show. I asked if someone was always there and I was told almost always. Well you guessed it, no one was there today. This really messed me up because I had made the slots in the frames for 3/4 inchs stringers instead of 5/8" since I thought I had found a good supplier (and I may have).

So I went to the lumber yard and searched through the WRC siding and managed to find three decent boards, not good ones. By the time I plane down the rough face they end up 5/8" thick. To small for the slots I had cut. I spent a good bit of time thinking about what to do. I finally decided that the only good answer was to glue up the slots and recut them.



I cut some oversized pieces and fitted each one to a slot and glued it in place. Once dry I will recut all the slots and clean them up.



Next step was to make the stringers. I planed the stringers down to 5/8" and ripped them to width.



Then cut the knots out with scarfs cuts. Glued them all up to 18' or longer.



I am going paddling tomorrow morning so I probably want get anything done. But my next step is to run the stringers through the shaper to round over the edges.

Then mount the frames on the strong back and start assembling the fuselage.

[Kayakkev]

So what will a kit consist of? Any idea of costs at this point? I am thinking it might be a Christmas present to myself.

[Kudzu]

I seriously doubt this one will be ready before Christmas. Well, I expect the boat to be done and I will have some time in it. But unless this boat is just perfect first time out I won't have a kit for it till after Christmas. But you never know.

Just check my web site or send me an email if you need more info on whats available.

[Kudzu]

DAY 4

Started out doing some sanding on the pattern frames. I have a couple I messed up and will have to be remade but there good enough for now. And I will almost always find stuff I want to change and I am already seeing some I may change.

Once the frames were done I decided not to run the stringers through the shaper at this time and just work on getting the patterns right.




Once I got a few stringers in place I started working on a new idea, an intermediate frame to support the coaming.




I started with my offsets and cut the outside and did a test fit. And as expected it didn't work out like I had in mind.




I spent a while in the 'moaning chair' and thought this through and decided it was OK after all so I cut out some more and did some measuring with the frame in place. It took some fiddling but I like what I have. You will have to wait to see the finished product though, it's still in my head.




With the frame finished I took a seat out of a Curlew and put in the boat to see how it would fit.



So far so good. I was actually very surprised at how well everything fit. I see a couple of things that I didn't/couldn't see on the computer but that is always the case. I had an idea that might change the design but I am not sure. But that's where I called it a day.

[Kudzu]

DAY 4

First order of business was to layout the bow and stern pieces. Pretty straight forward stuff. Got these made and put them in palace on the boat to 'eye-ball' them and make sure they look good and they do. But I am not sure I am happy with them. I keep looking the the photo and thinking I could improve it.




Here is the frame temporarily assembled. Everything looks good at this point.



Next step is take everything apart to make the final frames. I had two that changes. So I made the new ones and called it a day. Next step is run the stinger through the shaper to round over the edges and cut out the new frames and pattern route them. Then we start assembly. I need to settle on a what skin I want on this one.

[Griffin800]

Triple foredeck stringers is different. Looking forward to seeing what that'll look like covered.

Bill H.

[Kudzu]

You have seen this before Bill, just didn't know it. The revised Curlew does this. Two stinger off the coaming frame to the next frame, then it transitions to one stringer going forward to the bow. Gives a little more volume/space around the knees and feet

On this one it didn't look right though. My transitions were not smooth as I wanted. The two side stringers end to low or the middle stringer is to high. Take you pick. The transition was ugly and abrupt. Just to see what would happen I ran the center stinger all the way to bow just to see what would happen and it looked better.



In hind sight I probably could have left out the side stringer. The coaming will pull the fabric up at the coaming frame, so they are barely going to touch there anyway.

And yes I have stringer to plane down. One piece is a little thicker than the other one was.

[stumpy]

It's good to see that you're so dedicated to the craft that you'll let a build take the shirt off your back, Jeff! A novel idea for getting a quick look at what a small section will look like skinned! Yes, I've done similar things, and certainly will again....

David

[Kudzu]

DAY 5

Spent a few minutes cleaning up the edges of the patterns first thing. Then I laid them on out of the good ply and started cutting out the final frames. Once that was done I attach the patterns to the blanks and headed to the router and cut them to size. Here they are routed and ready to be separated from the patterns.





After that I take the time to set up the router with a round over bit and ease the edges of the frames. Doesn't really do much but it makes them look much better. No one but me ever see's most of them though.

Next I need to finish up the stringers. I clean up the scarf joints before I run them though the shaper. Once that is done I like to round over the edges of the stringer. It makes a smoother looking boat and since I routed the frames I don't have to square up the corners.

With 18-19' foot long stringers it takes a lot of space to run these. I am so glad it is warm enough to still open the shop door!





Once all that was done the day was pretty much gone. OK, there was time left, just wasn't much of me left. I was pooped! But I did press on for another hour or so. I wanted to mount the frames to the strong back before I quit. Then I called it a day!

[Kudzu]

Day 6

Not that much to see but I did get a good bit done. I have all the frames in place and ready to be lashed. I have the bow and stern pieces cut to shape. I will wait till the all the frames are lashed and then I I make the final cuts and fit them in place.



I lashed a few joints but I spent a large part of the afternoon shooting a new lashing video.






Not much to see but it's starting to look like kayak frame.

[Kudzu]

DAY 8

Well, lets start with another mistake. (Yes, I make lots of them!) I had the frame assembled and was working on the bow stem and something just didn't look like right. I keep looking down the stringer and they just were not looking like I expected they would. So I went back to the computer and checked the model. Nope, that is now what my boat looks like.

After a lot of looking and messing around I finally decided I had made a mistake lofting one of the frames. Of course it was the frame I had mounted to the strong back!! I lashed up to that point so I could take the frame out and it not fly apart on me.

Once I got it out and measured it and I was right, I was wrong.



With that done I was able to replace the frame with no drama, exploding stringer and as if by magic, everything lined up looked like it was supposed too.





Most of the last two days have been spent lashing the frames together. One of my goals after the last frame was to skip the epoxy and lash everything. I was gluing the stingers in place instead, but this frame will 100% lashed. I should finish the assembly of the frame tomorrow.

[wysedav]

Looks very nice, I like the upswept ridge. Keep on working and posting, the strip builders are starting to get to the top of the forumjavascript:emoticon('')

[JBratton]

Boat building AND OWWMs! Great boat and awesome tools!