News in the catalog

Saturday, March 14, 2015 (kayaks), 6 comments

As some have discovered I have added a couple of new models to the catalog – kayaks I have developed over a long time. An unexpected gap in the calendar offered the time needed to finish them.

Panthera is basically a surfski with a sea kayak deck – something that I have had several requests for the last year. Inspired by Dan Caouette’s beautiful hybrid Spray and a very a very well thought out suggestion and an offer to build the prototype from John Abercrombie, I completed the development of the hull – also including an idea that has been waiting for a while:  kayak lines inspired from the Jaguar CX75.

Nanoq is a new version of the legendary illorsuit kayak, that has inspired a lot of kayaks through the years, among them the Anas Acuta. My interpretation was first done for Seabird Designs under the name Qanik, but since Seabird will be targeting other markets than the ones my kayaks were developed for, it was time to update the kayak for strip building. It means that some concessions could be avoided, both technical (adaptation for industrial production) and commercial (flirting with customers with a lot less competence than the typical builder), and also that I can finetune the hull based on five years of experience with the original Qanik.

Jack 14 is also based on one the most popular of my Seabird models: Discovery, also designed five years ago. The background is the same as for Nanoq – a kayak that a lot of builders have been asking for – and one that could be significantly improved by disregarding the often inevitable commercial compromises, for example, the demand for both rudder and skeg. By wood strip construction and optimizing the hull for a skeg, Jack 14 is lighter, faster, more rigid and performs better in waves than the original Discovery.