Kayak sailing so much fun!

If you are a decent kayak paddler, you can be an excellent paddlesailor in no time. That is, a kayak sailor without daggerboards, outriggers or even a rudder. A (sea)kayak doesn't need all that to stay on track.

Kayaksailors in its purest form can paddlesail any course, even upwind, except straight against the wind. Or yes, you can but than you must tack some 40 degrees off the wind and zigzag your way forward just like any sailingvessel. However, tacking up wind brings you to point B in about the same time your kayakbuddies will arrive there when just paddling straight into the wind. But kayaksailing upwind on a long track (without tacking) will defenitly push you more ahead comparing to your buddies with no sail. Though you still need to padde along a bit on that course.

This blog deals with all aspects of kayak sailing, made possible by only three serious kayak sails: Flat Earth Kayak Sails (FEKS), Falcon Kayak Sails and Sea Dog Sails (a clone of FEKS) from Australia. 

I have absolutely no commercial interest in them. I'm just a happy customer and admire all three types of sails. They are 100 percent made for kayaks on rough, open waters, as you will see in the many movieclips on this blog.
The first ten posts or so are in English, the rest in Dutch. If you hit the translation button on the right bar, you will understand most of it in spite of the bewildering grammar and linguistic lingo.

Have fun and please leave a message from whichever country you are as a support for my effort.

Thank you,
Berend Schilder,
the Netherlands

Some profound paddlesailing!

A mighty trip with four kayaks on Lake Erie in the USA, all equipped with a Falcon sail. Seen from the aft of Patrick Forresters kayak, the owner of Falcon Sails. It's not an easy trip. Another kayaker is fiddling with his sail, so the others have to stand by for a while. Fortunately, they all have a waterproof VHF. 

Then they all continue in a strong wind and quite some waves in an endless journey. This recording lasts more than half an hour and shows exactly what it is like to paddlesail on open waters. Most courses are on a beam wind, occasionally just downwind. At the end, Forrester deliberately jibes a few times by swinging his hips. A jibe is often inevitable if you want to steer with the wind in your back to the side where your sail is standing. If you do nothing, the wind will automatically creep up behind the sail while steering, causing the sail to turn over to the other side at once. With a hip swing you can provoke this a little earlier in a more controlled fashion. 

Watch this movie on your laptop on a big screen and enjoy.

Peddelzeilen op Lake Erie 

My homemade sail

 

Photo: Marianne R.

The first test of my new homemade sail. Saturday, April 3, 2021, on the IJsselmeer (the Netherlands), on the way from Makkum to Workum. Wind force a big 4, north-northwest. The sail worked fine. I was mainly using my paddleblade as a rudder and hitting the brakes to stay close to the group, barely paddling. My fellow kayakkers had to work a little harder but also had fun on the surf. Measurements taken by a fellow navigator showed us we achieved an average of 12 km/h on large sections. Some other day I will test my sail on an upwind course, hopefully as close as 35 degrees off the wind. 

It was a beautiful trip, despite the cold, with a sleeping bag that was too thin at the campsite. Further details about the sail are in the post below.

Showing off my DIY sail

Voila, my own homemade sail has just been finished. Based on a kind of Flat Earth Foot Loose. But more like Flat Earth's copy, the Sea Dog sail. Also a footloose, so without a flap under the boom and loosely fitted between the mast and the tip of the boom.

It was a tedious job putting it together, for which many thanks to my wife who really learned the sewing craft.The twin batten sail is not flat, but has a certain curvature. Maybe a little too much. For the connoisseurs:

Bottom panel: camber 10 cm, draft position 25% from the mast (panel 0.95 m long)

Second panel: camber 10 cm, draft position 25% (panel 0.90 m long))

Third panel: camber 5 cm, draft position 15 %

Fourth panel: no camber, no draft. 

I would give my next sail a little less camber. It feels as if the battens create enough camber already. Also I am not yet satisfied with the tension of the two battens. They are former sail battens from an old windsurf sail. These battens may not be rigid enough.

The first test on the Kralingse Plas in my hometown Rotterdam was very promising. But due to the trees and changing wind direction I could not really judge how close the sail could get upwind. I reached 35 degrees, sometimes 40 degrees, probably because of the constantly changing wind direction. The heeling force seemed to be between that of a Falcon sail and a Flat Earth sail. At Easter, the real test follows during a tour on the large open IJsselmeer. That's where the more consistent winds rule. 

See also my previous posts about <link> 'Tinkering with sails yourself.'