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Re: Why Through-deck skeg
By:JohnAbercrombie
Date: 6/20/2017, 11:35 am
In Response To: Why Through-deck skeg (JayBabina)

I've had 3 glass manufactured boats with drop down skegs and never had a jam because of sand or stones.

You must be more careful than the average paddler in my area, or you don't have any of our 'beaches' that are entirely pebbles and shell. Perhaps your boats had better skeg designs? What brand(s) were they?
Lift the bow and drag a boat up the beach for a few yards, and a skeg slot at the stern will do its best to collect a beach sample. After lunch, when you launch you'll find the skeg won't deploy, so you'll need to raft up with a buddy who might be able to pull down the skeg with the string hanging out of the bottom. Otherwise, it's back to the beach and out with the pliers (you did bring some?) to try to pull the skeg free.
Experienced paddlers are careful to keep that slot off the ground.
A couple of friends have just taped over the skeg slot on their plastic boats -"I don't use it often, and every time I want to, it's jammed." A bit of a vicious circle IMO- frequent use helps to keep junk flushed out of the skeg box.
A skeel reduces the pebble and sand collection a lot because of its location. But, I can't figure out a way to arrange control line(s) for a through-deck skeel.

I remember when one S&G model had a thru deck skeg and the logic was that you could just lower it by hand if needed and even that puzzled me. I have trouble imagining the advantage of a thru deck skeg all things considered. Maybe easier waterproof integrity?

Well,if a buddy asked me to help yank the skeg down, I'd rather grab a loop on deck vs putting my hand under the hull and groping around for the thin cord, so that may be a factor. Anything that gets away from difficult-to-field-repair cable systems seems a plus to me. And, a lot of the glands between skeg box and tubing that I see, have globs of added sealant, so under-deck fittings seem to be problematical.
That said, my Reg Lake cable skeel has been 100% trouble-free - the continuous support for the cable really is an advantage.

Messages In This Thread

Other: Through-deck skeg experiences? *PIC*
JohnAbercrombie -- 6/18/2017, 1:07 pm
Re: Other: Through-deck skeg experiences?
Paul D -- 6/18/2017, 2:53 pm
Re: Other: Through-deck skeg experiences?
JohnAbercrombie -- 6/18/2017, 5:59 pm
Re: Other: Through-deck skeg experiences?
Paul D -- 6/18/2017, 9:06 pm
Re: Other: Through-deck skeg experiences?
Nick Schade - Guillemot Kayaks -- 6/18/2017, 8:29 pm
Re: Other: Through-deck skeg experiences?
JohnAbercrombie -- 6/18/2017, 9:37 pm
Re: Other: Through-deck skeg experiences? *PIC*
Nick Schade - Guillemot Kayaks -- 6/19/2017, 7:51 am
Re: Other: Through-deck skeg experiences?
Paul Sylvester -- 6/19/2017, 4:47 am
Why Through-deck skeg
JayBabina -- 6/20/2017, 8:12 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
JohnAbercrombie -- 6/20/2017, 11:35 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Etienne Muller -- 6/20/2017, 12:26 pm
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
JohnAbercrombie -- 6/20/2017, 6:22 pm
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Etienne Muller -- 6/20/2017, 12:19 pm
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
JohnAbercrombie -- 6/20/2017, 6:13 pm
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Etienne Muller -- 6/21/2017, 11:44 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
JohnAbercrombie -- 6/21/2017, 12:21 pm
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Bill Hamm -- 6/22/2017, 3:10 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Etienne Muller -- 6/22/2017, 11:17 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Bill Hamm -- 6/23/2017, 12:34 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
JohnAbercrombie -- 6/23/2017, 10:24 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Etienne Muller -- 6/23/2017, 11:24 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Dan Caouette (CSCWC) -- 6/23/2017, 11:52 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
JohnAbercrombie -- 6/23/2017, 11:59 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Dan Caouette (CSCWC) -- 6/23/2017, 12:49 pm
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Bill Hamm -- 6/24/2017, 1:02 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Etienne Muller -- 6/23/2017, 1:20 pm
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Steve Solomon -- 6/23/2017, 2:56 pm
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Bill Hamm -- 6/24/2017, 1:05 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Bill Hamm -- 6/24/2017, 12:59 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
JohnAbercrombie -- 6/24/2017, 10:19 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Etienne Muller -- 6/24/2017, 3:28 am
Skudder *PIC*
Dan Caouette (CSCWC) -- 6/24/2017, 9:35 am
Re: Skudder
Etienne Muller -- 6/24/2017, 9:40 am
Re: Skudder
Bill Hamm -- 6/24/2017, 8:35 pm
Re: Skudder
Bill Hamm -- 6/26/2017, 1:36 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Etienne Muller -- 6/22/2017, 11:22 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
JohnAbercrombie -- 6/22/2017, 8:17 pm
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Etienne Muller -- 6/23/2017, 5:23 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
JohnAbercrombie -- 6/23/2017, 10:32 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Nick Schade - Guillemot Kayaks -- 6/20/2017, 1:33 pm
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Paul D -- 7/5/2017, 4:57 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
JayBabina -- 7/5/2017, 8:17 am
Too Much Skeg
Nick Schade - Guillemot Kayaks -- 7/5/2017, 9:52 am
Re: Too Much Skeg *PIC*
JohnAbercrombie -- 7/5/2017, 11:30 am
Re: Too Much Skeg
JohnAbercrombie -- 7/5/2017, 11:34 am
Re: Why Through-deck skeg
Paul D -- 7/5/2017, 2:58 pm