TexasKayakFisherman.com est. 2000

[Ron Mc]

here's the chore, borrowing the dashboard bar from my daughter's Redfish 10

and fit it to have some kind of accessible rigging on my new/old Kestrel

This looks to be the most useful position, somewhere between ankles and mid-shin. And have to get the boat to the grass to try the ingresss/egress (too wet today).
My buddy teased me I was turning a SOT into a SINK. I told him it was more like a ragtop.
I had to narrow the legs a bit, move fittings around, and then figure how to attach to the boat.

Discovered this will be easy - the peg track has through-holes at the fasteners, so I can make cable loops using teflon-coated stainless cable and deep-sea crimp sleeves.
I have scads of cable and crimp sleeves, and the the crimping tool.
I bought a foot of 1/4" red shrink tubing to cover the crimps, from a reliable ebay vendor for $2 including postage with "guaranteed" delivery by next Mon - that's service.
I'll have to cut the loops off to move the pegs back more than halfway on the track, but they're nothing to replace.

Just waiting on the shrink tubing to arrive in tomorrow's mail to finish it up. I'll add a photo when it's done.

[JW FunGuy]

Gee Ron, if you had my short legs and my size 8 foot you wouldn’t be having this problem.

[Ron Mc]

I have to be able to adjust the boat so my daughter can play, so I'll end up cutting and replacing a few loops, but it's about the same effort as making a leader.

[Ron Mc]

ok, here are the tie-down loops

dashboard bar attached



along the way, also made a mod to the stringer cleat on this bar -
- here's the old cleat, which works and is inexpensive, a cheap nylon fairlead, and a V-cleat

I found the small Ronstan swivel cleat for a surprisingly inexpensive price on ebay, actually cheaper than the Ronstan C-cleat used in the assembly. I took the swivel off, and it bolts right in on the same centers as the cheap fairlead it replaced.
No words for how slick this works. Just slide the stringer nail through and pull it down - the saddle is designed to guide the line into the cleat when pulling down from any angle.
It's more secure than the Shaeffer cam cleat I used on my Tarpon - even if you bump the stringer up by accident, it doesn't come loose.

The cam cleat and fairlead are on an anodized base plate that was attached to the swivel base using the fairlead fasteners - the assembly easily removed from the swivel base and attached to the dashboard bar with 2" 8-32s.

It has the really nice stainless-lined fairlead and carbon-filled plastic saddle and cleat jaws.


ps - a source on the dashboard bar (Johnny bar). Harmony closed these out a few years ago, but they were actually made for Harmony by Mad Frog Gear, and Mad Frog Gear still makes them. They also make a wider, thinner dashboard.

[JW FunGuy]

WOW! Pretty dog gone clean. Nice job!

[TexasJim]

And my wife and friends call ME McGyver! Jeez! TexasJim

[Ron Mc]

there's not much else I can do to this boat to make it fish - a dashboard with rodholder, and a trolley - that's about it.
I have a plan on the trolley and have stuff ordered - may be awhile until I get some time, though, all my Trout in the Classroom classes are releasing their brown trout fry in the river this month (and I'm also on call for jury duty in fed district court for the whole month).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llyQ0Et ... e=youtu.be

I was searching trolley hardware on ebay when I ran across the swivel cam cleat at a low price that shocked me - ran out and measured centers on the nylon fairlead, and knew it would bolt right on...
Ended up buying all my trolley hardware from a marine vendor on the west coast who had the small sea dog rings.

[Ron Mc]

solved the primary problem for a no-holes trolley installation on the Kestrel - a fairlead to bend the trolley top line with the hull, and keep it out of the cockpit.

Was looking at the stainless pad eyes on the boat. However, the pad eyes are installed with machine screws and nyloks inside, all done before the kevlar bulkheads were installed inside the hull. Everything is behind a sealed bulkhead except the opposed pad eyes accessible through the stern hatch.

Looks like it may be the only place I need to bend the trolley line to follow the hull contour.
I used a small Ronstan shock, and a nylon R-clip installed as a washer beneath the pad eye.


The outside of the Shock will keep the top and bottom lines on the trolley smoothly separated.

Think I have the rest of the trolley worked out, and have the parts to finish it. I'll get another post up when I get it finished.

Edit - making some more parts, and figured out I'm probably going to need one more fairlead lashed on to keep the top and bottom lines separate before I button it up. I have the parts, just have to figure out how I want to lash it.
But here's a Ronstan 20mm orbit block lashed to a Scotty clip - I had found the ball-bearing all-plastic orbit blocks for $10/ at a west coast marine supplier, which is a pretty good price, and ordered enough needed supplies to get free shipping.
The same blocks have been working on my Tarpon for 10 years.

It's going to go on the stern.
The lashing pattern goes through the slot in the Scotty clip, and the slide freedom of the block in the Scotty clip is limited by the slot - it can slide about 45 degrees, which also will move the block farther down when the ring is back there with a drag load.

For the bow end, lashed the other block to another Shock. Drilled out the Scotty clip to accept the bungee, and my final tension will be knotting the bungee after my ring is tied in - but not quite ready to tie in the ring yet...

[Ron Mc]

All done - you can see I got the curve I needed, and it works slick

I ended up lashing a Shock to the mid pad eye, and here's the span between the two shocks that do all the work.
They keep the lines separate, and act as bearings on both lines going both ways.
They also make it easy to pick which line you need to pull from the cockpit.
Both of these shocks are rigid - pulled the lashing tags with pliers and a pair of double half-hitches in the two final wraps before I reefed it - it has so much tension in the lashing, it's like a rock.
The aft shock mounted in the nylon R-clip, I had to rotate it slightly to prevent the trolley ring from hooking it, but it glides 100% now - both ways.
A close-up of the shock I lashed to the mid pad eye

I had it, and added a 3rd shock loose on a deck bungee, simply to guide the top line where I want it go over the sternwell net.
I lashed the Scotty clip to keep it pinned where I want it, and there's enough room in the pad eye above it to tie down the boat with a cam strap.

The bow end - I'll actually never run an anchor here - I'll mostly use the trolley for deploying a drift sock to the stern and, of course, retrieving it.
I will move the trolley to this end to stake the boat. All my tension is in the short looped bungee, and don't need a lot.
The front Scotty clip is over the bow hatch tie-down webbing.

The boat is ready to go fishing.

[shoffer]

Looks good. So go fishing and post up a sweet RonMc report!

[Ron Mc]

thanks friend - there's too much water everywhere, and more coming down. They posted photos on corpusfishing of docks under the tide, and no beach on the beach.
http://www.corpusfishing.com/messageboa ... hp?t=38427

about all that's left is hill country headwaters
https://grtumembers.org/forums/topic/hi ... #post-4257

[yangjianhunt]

I am learning a lot from your rigging . Beautiful, neat, and thorough rigging.
Also the Kestrel 140 SOT has been one of my dream SOT kayak. 24'' wide, 14' long, super light Kevlar material, extremely fast for SOT, super fishable too. It's just near impossible nowadays to find a used one.
I was wondering how much faster do you find this kayak?
Me drooling...

[Ron Mc]

hi friend,
compared to my T160, it's not noticeably faster until I'm cruising with my buddy in his Revo 16 in Mirage Go.
It keeps up without inordinate effort, and my T160 is close but won't quite get there.
Where you really notice the difference on this boat is picking it up - it's nothing to single-hand.

I am learning a lot from your rigging . Beautiful, neat, and thorough rigging.
Also the Kestrel 140 SOT has been one of my dream SOT kayak. 24'' wide, 14' long, super light Kevlar material, extremely fast for SOT, super fishable too. It's just near impossible nowadays to find a used one.
I was wondering how much faster do you find this kayak?
Me drooling...

If you really want one of these boats, CD will make you one. I had to contact them with questions about the hull construction and whether the sealed pad eyes were backed with nyloks before they installed the sealed bulkheads.
I was very happy to find my boat at TG in San Marcos, and she at CD mentioned they'll still make you one custom.

Thanks for your kind comments.
I found something I didn't like in my rigging - my front trolley attachment causes the webbing to cry uncle and rotate on its mounting bolt. Since the webbing mounting bolts are accessible through the front hatch, they're easy to remove the backing and replace.
I'm going to solve that with one of 2 fixes making a new mount for the front scotty clip - trying both - a D-ring on a single-fastener plate installed as a washer,
Since this is 1/8" hole, I'll have to drill it open to 3/16" to accept the M5 - a nice thing is I have a box of M5 bicycle fasteners to pick from.

or shouldered M5 eye-bolt+washer replacing the webbing mount M5 panhead

Another nice thing about ebay, piecemeal small parts like this are sold and shipped for very reasonable prices. Just imagine what you need, and go hunting. I even started at Bolt Depot and, as good as they are, they didn't have any eye bolts smaller than 1/4"/M6. Found both stainless options by googling "deck eye images" and clicking on what looked right, which linked me to ebay sellers.
I'll post the final solution this weekend.

Since I had never showed under the front hatch cover, here it is - it's sealed amazingly well, with the same primary hatch cover and tension band as the rear hatch -
- of course the one webbing strap is removed.
I mentioned this boat was bought as a demo - no one has been inside this front hatch. I was afraid there was water inside it, but turned out to be excess resin (more likely catalyst) from when the hull was laid.
I cleaned it out with a sponge and denatured alcohol, and the resin smell is filling the garage today.
Next time out, my icemule is going into this hatch, to help counter the weight of me in the seat, especially since the sternwell will carry more (light) gear when I go fishing.

There's a beauty ABS Eddyline Caribe 14 in the for sale forum - maybe not quite as light, but fast and more stable.

[yangjianhunt]

Ron, I saw the Caribbean 14 yak you mentioned - it is a nice one. I once almost pulled the trigger on a hurricane skimmer 140 which I think has a similar ABS hull. Yep I think Caribbean 14 should be fast and nicely stiff.
For now though, I'll have to settle with the original scupper from ocean kayak that I bought used (very used, matter of fact it was made in 1987, the original scupper first production year), for the little bit added speed over my other two wider paddle yaks.
It had no mods for fishing so I am rigging it up for BTB fishing this summer.

[Ron Mc]

Cool - if you haven't seen this article, this probably the best archive on "classic" kayaks
http://www.sit-on-topkayaking.com/Artic ... emier.html
and their archive searches pages and pages on OK Scupper
http://www.sit-on-topkayaking.com/SEARC ... oom_sort=0

post some rigging results for us

[Ron Mc]

Today's mail brought the D-rings, and tomorrow's tracking says it's bringing the eye bolts.
So since I had one fix to install today, I did, and took a photo.
Not sure if I'm keeping this, so I didn't cut the bungee tag.
Works great. The only thing I don't like about it is that the D-ring rattles.
It's very easy to get into the front hatch cover without futzing the trolley.
If I decide to keep it, will also buy a few-mm-longer M5 panhead to make sure I get a good bite on the nylok backing.
I would have bought grey-anodize Shocks, but the place I ordered everything only had one pair of that color, and had two of the red, which it turns out I used all four.

[JW FunGuy]

OK Ron, here is a thought. Take all these brilliant ideas of yours and package them together. So the rest of us IDIOTS can have these works of art on our kayaks!
Thanks!

[Ron Mc]

OK Ron, here is a thought. Take all these brilliant ideas of yours and package them together. So the rest of us IDIOTS can have these works of art on our kayaks!
Thanks!

Jerry, the reason I share this stuff is it may click a light in someone else who then innovates his own solution for his rigging.
In another life when I sailed Lake Travis, sailors never stopped slicking their rigging. This is all I've got for a yacht now...

I did replace the seat with a thin Padz and back band, lowering me a full inch, adjusted the back band so I don't slide down, and giving me more room to move in the cockpit. Had the boat in the yard to test getting in and out - the dashboard bar is perfect - you'd put your feet in the same way if it wasn't there.
Think I'd be happier with my feet about an inch farther forward, and the next thing I may tackle is heel blocks and remove the foot pegs.

Also while I was on the grass, adjusted the thigh straps, and I could balance the boat on the ground with my legs.

Probably none of this would be cost-effective to package, and costs twice what a packaged trolley would, but it works the way I expect it to, and didn't have to drill any holes in the hull.
Duane at TG had this boat listed for $950 - was delighted to get it at that price.

[JW FunGuy]

Yea, I know Ron, tinkering with it is half the fun! You’ve seen the pics of my boat, I kind of like it simple but functional with just a simple anchor trolly, stake out pole and rod holders (planning on getting a drift sock after reading your posts ) But my partner thinks I have too much stuff on my boat! He just has an anchor attached to a line to the stern and a retrieve line in the cockpit, it seems to work fine for him. But he doesn’t like to tinker.
Thanks for all you “ideas”

[Ron Mc]

ok, the eye bolt is just plain sexy.
The bolt thread is already 5mm longer than the panhead it replaced, making backing the nylok easy.
It lifts all the front end hardware above all my other rigging.
This is the final joint on the front end
Since I was here Jerry, here's now I rig a drift sock with a trolley.
Rigging a drift sock works best with 2 lines - good idea to make them 2 colors.
The shorter working line anchors to the drift sock parachute.
The longer deployment line ties to the back of the drift sock, collapsing the parachute when you pull, and needs to tag in your cockpit.
(You have to bring in your drift sock to paddle upwind and set up a new drift.)

My best rigging clips the working line on a scotty clip to the trolley ring, routing the deployment line through the ring, and lashing the deployment line to a cockpit z-cleat.
Here, the black line on the scotty clip is the short working line attached to the drift sock parachute - the working line scotty clip grabs the trolley ring.
You can rig all this on the water with the ring at the cockpit, and then use the trolley to move it to the stern.
The yellow line going through the ring is the deployment line, and has to go all the way to the cockpit.
The working line is always tight under drag load, and the deployment line is always slack, except when you're hauling in your drift sock.

Here you may be able to see a little logic to my dashboard bar rigging.
Confused by the yellow bow line and yellow stringer, the drift sock deployment line goes through the large shock and into the z-cleat.
Pulling the yellow deployment line collapses the drift sock parachute so you can easily haul it to the boat - it will bring it all the way into the cockpit and brings the trolley, too when it gets there.

Here's a view from the front, maybe showing the Z-cleat better

If you have a short-enough boat, you don't really even need a trolley to run a drift sock, but on a long boat, it's really helpful.
Plus with a trolley, you don't have to go out with the drift sock rigged - you can rig the drift sock from scratch sitting in the boat on the water.

[JW FunGuy]

Thanks Ron, that was helpful. How long is your working line? I think I read a post here that said 4 feet was good. Does it depend on the length of your boat? I know a rudder makes a bit of a difference as well.

[Ron Mc]

made me measure - mine is 6' - yes short is fine for the drift sock working line

here's my Tarpon cockpit - the Z-cleat for the deployment line is on slidetrax


If you can tie a bowline, you don't have to use any clips or cleats - you can tie your working line to the ring with a bowline, or if you don't have a trolley, tie the working line to the lift handle on the stern of your boat.
You can tie your deployment line to a side lift handle.
But a trolley also helps keeping all those lines out of your rudder.

[TexasJim]

Neat job, Ron! One thing I did on my drift sock was to attach a yellow oval float to one of the four straps, right at the sock, That makes that strap always float just at the surface of the water, and, it keeps the sock from trying to spin. Plus, if I lose or have to cut loose the drift sock, that float will be visible and I can find and retrieve it. TexasJim

[Ron Mc]

great idea Jim.

and a few totally gratuitous rigging photos



in this last one, you can see how the orbit block lashing through the scotty clip slot is like a pair of stirrups, to slide in the scotty clip slot

[Ron Mc]

One final touch on the trolley.
Was looking at my lashing on the mid shock attachment to the stainless pad eye.
When I worked on removing this, discovered just how solid I had made it

But had a spare shock and No 6 sex bolts in my small fasteners, so I tested attaching on the opposite pad eye using a nylon R-clip and the sex bolt.


Liked it so much after a few days, I untied one of my trolley ring anchor bends, and replaced the lashing with this shock attachment.