Basic Technology by Michael Wolf

Michael Wolf is a photographer working out of Hong Kong and possibly other cities.  A while back I ran into his photos of what he called "Bastard Chairs."  I would have picked a more flattering term, but bastard chairs is probably what most people would regard them as.  In any case, these chairs are what you get when people who are not professional chair makers improvise on chair repair.  They are in a sense, folk technology.  Go to the link http://photomichaelwolf.com/#bastard-chairs/1 to see more examples.

Housing is another area where folk technology proliferates.  And Michael Wolf has done photographs of that as well in a photo group called The box men of Shinkuju Station.

How does this relate to skin on frame kayak technology?  Well, given a need, people will invent a way to make do with what they have.  That is the essence of most primitive technology.  In our own very compartmentalized world where everything has to be done by experts we are usually isolated from folk technology and instead overwhelmed by what we commonly think of high technology.  But inject poverty and take away the money that it takes to fund the expert technologists, voila, up pops folk technology like mushrooms after a rain.

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Planking progress stalled by need to encapsulate stem

As January keeps winding on, it seems as though I’ve had a million things to juggle or deal with that keep interfering with my boatbuilding progress.

I am making progress, however.

I’ve gotten the forward starboard plank screwed into position. It is not epoxied on yet, however. The simple reason is the fact that I have not yet encapsulated the stem, which is still bare plywood all the way around. Once the planking is on, it will be very difficult to reach certain parts of the stem in order to coat it with epoxy, (or “encapsulate” it), as protection against moisture. So, I need to encapsulate the stem before I permanently attach the planking.

The forward plank on the starboard side is screwed into position.

Detail view at the stem

In this detail view, you can see the how the added chine strips got blended into the shape of the forward bend in the chine.

Unfortunately, I don’t have on-hand the proper type of epoxy for encapsulation. What I have on-hand is System Three Silvertip Gel Magic. VERY viscous stuff that is great to work with to glue parts together. However, I need something much thinner for encapsulation. I liked the Gel Magic enough that I decided I’d try another System Three product, so I ordered the regular Silvertip epoxy. It should be here early this week.

In the meantime, I have fitted, glued and screwed the butt block into position on the port side of the boat. 

Fitting the butt joint on the port side. Without the butt block in place, the forward plank does not match the curvature of the aft plank.

By comparison, here is the butt joint on the starboard side. The butt block allows the forward planking to match the curvature of the aft planking.

The port side butt block, before being epoxied into place.

The butt block epoxied into position against the aft planking on the port side.

The next step will be to encapsulate the stem & a few other parts with 2 or 3 layers of the Silvertip epoxy. Then, I can permanently attach the starboard planking. After that, the rest of the port side planking.

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