Rating: Summary: A comprehensive how-to for building a beautiful wooden kayak Review: Strip-building is the craft of converting a small pile of thin wood strips into a boat of exquisite beauty. The art of strip-building is assembling those strips into a striking example of a fully functioning, rugged water craft. The strip-built method permits a unique degree of design freedom, both in the hydrodynamic shape of the boat and the graphic arrangement of the wood.There are several reasons to build a kayak. Maybe you are a wood worker who wants to try a project completely different from furniture, or possibly you are an experienced kayaker who wants a unique, high performance boat, or it could be you are a novice woodworker and kayaker, but you want to gain experience in both. Whatever your reason, you will find building a sea kayak to be unlike anything you have done before. If you are used to building chairs, think of a chair in which you can cross an ocean. If you are used to roto-molded plastic or fiberglass kayaks, imagine gleaming varnish and wood cutting through the water ahead of you in a rugged boat that is lighter than most boats you have previously paddled. If you are a rank-beginner, you can enjoy the satisfaction of creating your own introduction to kayaking. My book starts with background information about how design affects performance, choosing materials, and selecting tools. Then it comprehensively covers building a boat from setting up shop, through creating forms, working the wood, fiberglassing and varnishing. Instructions for fitting out the finished kayak, making a wooden paddle complete the project. Along the way you will learn how to raise the boat above a simple way to get on the water to a stunning work of art. Over 200 illustrations showing every step of the building processes make it feel like you are watching over my shoulder as I build a boat. I hope you can virtually build a boat by looking at just the drawings and photographs. The text is comprehensive enough that you should be able to build the boat without looking at the figures. The combination of the two will make the project very clear. I came to design and build my own kayaks because I wanted the best performing boats available and decided I could make something better than I could buy. With the help of my book, so can you.
Rating: Summary: the strip built sea kayak Review: The book is very detailed and informative covers subject matter fully. Better than other do it yourself books on the art of building a boat using the strip method of building. Couldn't put it down once I started reading.
Rating: Summary: The touchstone book for strip building. Review: The most complete book on strip building out there. The author also generously provides complete designs for 3 different beautiful kayaks.
Rating: Summary: This is the best one folks! Review: There are perhaps four books out on building kayaks available through Amazon. This is the most recent to date, and definately the best of the four I've purchased so far. I just completed a canvas number on G. Putz's book, ( which is an exceptional book also), but I wish I had seen this one at the onset for it's strength as a general reference. So far I've know of three basic kayak building techniques - canvas on frame, stitched plywood, and strip kayaks. This book describes the very advanced (and perhaps most beautiful) method of making a boat of strips with re-enforcing epoxy. They are absolutely beautiful creations, though probably a little heavier than the plywood ones. This is a very highly detailed book with great photographs and computer generated diagrams. The author is a professional boat-builder who, like the magician that reveals his tricks, descibes everything - down to proper material selection, a list of current suppliers, plans (x3 + paddles), scientific details on boyancy and design, and numerous other details. This book is useful to those going off of other techniques and advices. Skill-wise I would say that you'd have to be fairly advanced, not afraid to use epoxy and fiberglass, and the owner of at least a band-saw. ( unless you buy a kit or pre-cut wood) A great resource! I'm building a strip one next! P.S. - the guy who says that these boats aren't seaworthy is full of bunk!
Rating: Summary: This is the best one folks! Review: There are perhaps four books out on building kayaks available through Amazon. This is the most recent to date, and definately the best of the four I've purchased so far. I just completed a canvas number on G. Putz's book, ( which is an exceptional book also), but I wish I had seen this one at the onset for it's strength as a general reference. So far I've know of three basic kayak building techniques - canvas on frame, stitched plywood, and strip kayaks. This book describes the very advanced (and perhaps most beautiful) method of making a boat of strips with re-enforcing epoxy. They are absolutely beautiful creations, though probably a little heavier than the plywood ones. This is a very highly detailed book with great photographs and computer generated diagrams. The author is a professional boat-builder who, like the magician that reveals his tricks, descibes everything - down to proper material selection, a list of current suppliers, plans (x3 + paddles), scientific details on boyancy and design, and numerous other details. This book is useful to those going off of other techniques and advices. Skill-wise I would say that you'd have to be fairly advanced, not afraid to use epoxy and fiberglass, and the owner of at least a band-saw. ( unless you buy a kit or pre-cut wood) A great resource! I'm building a strip one next! P.S. - the guy who says that these boats aren't seaworthy is full of bunk!
Rating: Summary: Well worth every penny Review: This book is excellent! It gives you every bit of information you need and more, to build a high quality sea kayak. A must have.
Rating: Summary: A poor rehash Review: This book like most other books on boat building is notable for its ommissions. There are so many I will mention only one. Most important perhaps - There is no method given to help you detemine if the boat you have constructed is structurally sound. You CAN follow the author's instructions and produce a boat which is UNSAFE to use in any location.
Rating: Summary: Excellent - why didn't I buy it before building? Review: This is really an excellent book. I'm an engineer, and college professor, and publications like this are collector's items! I admire the completeness, and the very digestable writing style. Graphics are very clear and explicative. Only suggestion: the glossary should include a list of the tools and other technical terms.
Rating: Summary: This is the book that made wooden boats possible for me. Review: This is the best "how-to" book I've read. Five months ago I had two plastic kayaks and knew absolutely nothing about kayak-building. I bought this book, after wandering into Nick's website. Now I'm starting my second wooden kayak and contemplating a lineup of other wooden boats to follow. Why? Because Nick's enthisiasm is infectious, and his humanity, his good humor, his attention to detail, and his love of what he does are everywhere in this book. This is the book I come back to over and over. Don't be discouraged by an earlier review from a man well-known to the online kayak-building community for his consistent disparagement and negativity. My one criticism of the book? I wish it had more color pictures of these beautiful boats so I could show others to explain my enthusiasm.
Rating: Summary: The Definitive Resource for Strip Built Kayaks Review: This is the best book I have ever seen on the subject of strip built technique. I have read this book, several times, and created a boat based on the designs from the author. This book has ALL the information needed to make a beautiful kayak. It is my primary shop reference, with specific details on design, how to assemble the strips, how to fair the boat, how to fiberglass, how to outfit and finish the boat. The steps are described in detail, and richly illustrated with informative pictures. Thank you Nick Schade for your excellent book, your superb website and your magnificent boats. I picked this boat for all the wrong reasons. I had not paddled one, or evaluated the technical merits of it's design with respect to other boats. I didn't do a cost-benefit analysis or listen to the advice of friends. When I saw that boat, she stole my heart. Honestly, I can't imagine being happier with a boat if I had done all those other things anyway. To think that by using what I learned in your book, in thirteen short weeks I watched a bundle of sticks and a roll of blueprints metamorphose into a such a beatutiful creature, is almost incredible. She may have come out of my basement through my hands, but she's your creation too, and I thank you for helping me make it real. The single biggest disadvantage to having a boat made from this book is that it takes much longer to launch, because everyone around wants to know where you got such a lovely boat. This book will get you there, so plan ahead for the delays now. Sincerely, Ed Valley
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