: risto

: ps. if one were to keep moving the seat on a daily basis, on the water even,
: what might be the best way to fix it ?

Hi Risto,

It looks like you've came upon the same thought that I had ... an adjustable seat!! If a minor weight shift, fore or aft, of an inch or two can make a noticable difference, then it seems to me that you would have to keep your load perfectly balanced (fore and aft) each time you went out in order to achieve the same performance from the boat that you would get when the storage areas were empty. In efect, you (the paddler) would become the ballast. Of course, you'd have to make sure you didn't seriously overload the fore storage area because the seat wouldn't move backward as much as it could move forward. All this sounds good (at least to me) but in real life, its probably the way cartoons got started.

Any way...in reading whats been said so far on the subject, I may have an idea of something that I did wrong when I made the seatback for my wife's Guillemot single. I made it a little wider than what Nick showed in his Book. Yea, I know. You already know whats comming next! I can't place the seatback as far to the rear of the cockpit as a narrower back would go because it hits the coaming on both sides as soon as the coaming starts to curve in at the rear... which then pushes the seat bottom forward...which places the paddler forward...which pushes the center of mass,weight,buoyancy ,and whatever else there is, FORWARD!!! All this can be summed up in one line ... the boat doesn't act QUITE the way it was designed to act. All because of one, seemingly insignificant change in the seatback.

But don't get the wrong idea. My wife loves the boat just the way it is and if I get everything where its supposed to be, I wouldn't be a bit surprised if she slid the blasted seat forward again!

Not only that but when she tried to get the boat back from our daughter...well I thought I'd have to do a lot of sanding to get the claw marks out!

OK. I'll calm down now. Blame it on a short night, really strong coffee, and a few spokes missing from my wheel!! Anyway, hope you guys are right about "an inch or two", cause thats about what I can gain by cutting that cute little seatback down to size. Kinda makes it look like Nick DOES know whats goin on, huh.

Keep those posts commin' guys. They keep us all thinking! Happy Building. Charles.