Boat Building Forum

Find advice on all aspects of building your own kayak, canoe or any lightweight boats

Re: Skin-on-Frame: Storage Compartments
By:Paul G. Jacobson
Date: 11/23/2011, 8:51 pm
In Response To: Skin-on-Frame: Storage Compartments (Trey)

: Another new guy question. I've been looking at building a skin on
: frame. Is it possible to put storage compartments on these? I've
: been looking at a lot of pictures, and havent seen anything yet.

The easy and usual way to do storage on a S-o-F boat is to use dry bags, or float bags, and just stuff them into the ends. They provide some flotation for safety and reduce the amount of water which can get into the boat. They are cheap to buy, and easy to make if you want something custom sized.

If you plan to use bags and want to get them out of your way, build in a pulley at each end of the boat, and thread a rope through it before you skin the boat. Attaching your bag to one end of the rope lets you pull it far to the end. To retrieve it, you might want to tie another rope to the bottom of the sack. Pull that and the bag comes out.

Otherwise, get this picture in your mind: A tandem S-o-F with two cockpits. Now imagine that one of those cockpits is smaller, covered with a soft or hard hatch cover, and lined with a sea sock, or just a heavy plastic bag. There you have a hatch and storage compartment. Put it wherever you want. If you want more than one, go for it. Make as many coamings for cockpit or hatches as you want. Each one takes a few more minutes to stitch around when you skin it, but that is fairly trivial work.

Hope this helps

PGJ

Messages In This Thread

Skin-on-Frame: Storage Compartments
Trey -- 11/23/2011, 6:06 pm
Re: Skin-on-Frame: Storage Compartments
Bob Johns -- 11/23/2011, 8:12 pm
But wait; there's more.
Bob Johns -- 11/23/2011, 8:18 pm
Re: Skin-on-Frame: Storage Compartments
Paul G. Jacobson -- 11/23/2011, 8:51 pm
Re: Skin-on-Frame: Storage Compartments
Trey -- 11/23/2011, 9:46 pm
Re: Skin-on-Frame: Storage Compartments
David Bynoe -- 11/24/2011, 7:30 pm