Puncture Proof Sidekicks Revisted

Hey all,

I reworked the lobster buoy sidekick and notched for the PVC bringing the two buoys tight together.
1. Silicone II adhesive can be used between the two buoys to seal the seam between the buoys for sailing and reduce drag or keep water from forcing itself between the buoys.
2. I added a 1" slip coupler to the "T" by glueing it end to end to the "T" with PVC cement. No 1" PVC connecting them for the 1" PVC inside diameter is too small for the sidekick arm.
3. One 1/8" thick "O" ring pushed against the arm stop as a spacer and the modified "T" fits nice and snug between the stop & the clip but with free rotary motion.
4. Before glueing the 1/2" vertical into the 1" to 1/2" slip reducer I placed a rubber stopper into the 1/2" PVC and glued in place. This stopper prevents water from entering the "T" and filling the PVC assembly with water.

Here is the modified unit:







I can now swap from inflatable sidekick to puncture proof sidekick depending on conditions and tasks.

Revo

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I would rather be kayaking and think about work than to be at work thinking about kayaking.
A Thrill Ride is being dragged around in your kayak for 40 minutes by an extremely large fish.

Hey Revo,
Lookin' good--a very nice job!

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Revo,
Looks very professional -great job!
I'm interested to learn how they compare when sailing as opposed to the sidekicks. Buoyancy, resistance through water etc. I like the way you have adapted them to fit the standard sidekick bars.

how's it goin Apalach & stringy,

I hope to sail test them this weekend. The wind has been in excess of 20 knots & higher gusts this past week so could not give them a test. Well I could have but elected not to

I primarily built them for fishing just afraid I would be standing and that one sloppy cast and a hook would catch my nice inflatable then pop and over I go or tide skimming over an oyster bed and slice, pop and a kayak flat. For sailing I still intend to use the inflatables. I wanted an easy alternate option without having to build a completely different floatie rig.

I will sail test them perhaps today, suppose to have nice breezy conditions. Kepnutz was very interested in them for sailing since he has had a kayak flat for some time.

Hope you are doing well Kep.

stringy as far as bouyancy each bouy has 15# bouyancy so 30# each side. I have stood and rocked side to side with the yak at 45 degrees & higher and the float totally submerged and no turtle. I almost went over but the revolution was stable and I was standing on the gunnel.

I will post result and maybe some vid or pics.

Revo

_________________
I would rather be kayaking and think about work than to be at work thinking about kayaking.
A Thrill Ride is being dragged around in your kayak for 40 minutes by an extremely large fish.

Sail Test update:

Sadly the sail test did not pan out as planned. The shape of the lobster buoy acted like a torpedo and not like an outrigger when leaning to the side as hiked out when sailing. The floatie dove nose first and pinwheeled under even just the sprint power of the pedals.
For added stability while standing they work fine but lack a proper hull shape to glide over the water without becoming a torpedo while hiked over under faster speeds.

For sailing the inflatable sidekicks works best.

Kepnutz, I would recommend you get that replacement sidekick.

Revo

_________________
I would rather be kayaking and think about work than to be at work thinking about kayaking.
A Thrill Ride is being dragged around in your kayak for 40 minutes by an extremely large fish.

Thanks for that report Revo!
I had suspected that may be possible due to the buoys shape. If you look at other ama they have much more floatation up top which must prevent the diving you described.
I have considered getting the sidekicks many times but have always been put off because they are inflatable and therefore not as durable as I would like. We also have lots of oysters here.
At one stage I was considering using Hobie BOB's (mast tip floats) mounted upsidedown as ama on my Tandem.

They seem to be the right shape and are designed to slip through the air but I wasn't sure how much resistance they would offer when submerged or how strong the mounts would be when battered by chop.
Thoughts anyone??

Hey Revo,Stringy,Latchpatch,Roadie
The baby bob looks interesting too bad the lob pot floats did not work. I wonder if the bigger size will do the job. Maybe styrofoam and fibreglass would work just shape it by hand etc

Thats me in front on a wave hunt instead of easter eggs.

If anyone knows where I can order a floatie replacement "online" please contact me. Or post a link here if possible.
Thank You
Kepnutz

Doing some windsurfing

Doing some mountain biking

Hold on just a doggone minute here. I have been sailing my Sport in about 20 knot winds, as well as pedaling as fast as my scrawny legs could go with the lobster pot buoys, and never have I experienced anything close to the "torpedo" syndrome that Revo reports. Not to say it could never happen with my setup--just that I have not experienced anything like that as yet.



One thing I do, however, is to set the bottom of my floats to about 2 inches above the still water surface (or as close to it as I can estimate), as well as to angle the forward tip of the buoys up slightly. This was done specifically to try to avoid the possibility of the buoys digging in regardless of what reach I am on.

Another advantage of the lobster buoys and the RAM mounts is that if enough force is applied to the buoy, the RAM hand clamp will probably slip, rather than the buoy becoming totally submerged. So we have a slight fudge factor here, as opposed to a rigid Sidekick bar. However, I seem to recall that the Sidekick bar elevation above the water surface has 3 settings. If so, then I would experiment with the 2 settings at the highest elevation to see how that works before sh**-canning (old Navy term!) the whole rig. In addition, the RAM mounts are infinitely adjustable--up, down, forward, and back. Although I had not considered this previously, this adjustability may help in the overall sailing scenario.



Finally, we have to be careful about sailing/pedaling/paddling any yak when conditions don't warrant it. Now, this is not to say that the conditions that Revo had available were anything unusual. But anytime simple pedaling could put a lobster pot buoy underwater then installation and/or wave conditions may be a bit more than I want to deal with while underway. Here's a pic that Stringy will surely recognize--the OZ surfboat competitions! Just my $.01 worth.

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Hi Apalach,

I have not sh**canned the idea. I was out sailing on my lake and it was 2" - 6" swells. Though wind was easily 10-15 knots the lake is somewhat sheltered by the neighborhood so the waves are always minimal.

The key difference between your setup and utilizing the sidekick arms is that the bouy is not FIXED as it is in your rig. The bouy rotates just like the inflatable ama thus makes it nose dive for a torpedo effect. If the bouy were in a fixed position and nose elevated the condition probably would not happen. Alas another test is due after devising a way to FIX the bouy on a sidekick arm. The rotation is needed in order to utilize the 3 position settings or as you rotate the bar you rotate the floatie if fixed.
The 3 position option may have to go by the wayside.

I have never said lob bouys don't work ,, thus far they just are not working on a sidekick bar. I could see while I was moving along if they were fixed and nosed up they would possibly work ok. How they would react even fixed to a substantial wave I cannot answer without field testing.

Perhaps a slip pin through the PVC "T" sleeve and arm keeping the floatie in fixed position will work. Fixing the floatie will of course negate the position adjustment except maybe from lowest to highest will invert the floatie to clear the water when not needed.

Thinking Cap is still on on this one. Open to suggestions as well.

_________________
I would rather be kayaking and think about work than to be at work thinking about kayaking.
A Thrill Ride is being dragged around in your kayak for 40 minutes by an extremely large fish.

Hey Revo,
OK-gotcha--I wasn't clear on exactly how you secured the lobster float on the Sidekick bar. AND in fact you don't (secure it completely, that is). From your pics, it looked like it might be able to rotate, but I thought--naaah, no way. I had forgotten that the inflatable jobs were in fact free to rotate.

OK--as you say, back to the ole drawing board. Seems to me, without seeing your rig, that there must be some simple way to solve this problem. What about adding a 2-3 oz fishing weight/sinker (or heavier) to the rear underside of the aft buoy to keep its nose up when underway? Or set up a three pin arrangement, one for each fixed setting of the float arm? Just guessing here, but I'll betcha the Hobie engineers went thru a similar mental exercise when they designed the original Sidekicks! Good luck, and keep us posted.

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Hey Apalach,

I posted this this morning but in the revamp of the forum it somehow disappeared.

Kepnutz some good news or at least til the water test but I feel it will be a success..

I Fixed the lob bouy floatie onto the sidekick bar via a hole drilled 90 degrees to vertical in the PVC "T". Using the sidekick retainer clip you can clip the floatie to the sidekick arm. By tilting the sidekick center bar bottom hole slightly forward about 5 degrees from vertical that will set the floatie at a 5 degree nose up attitude. This should be enough nose up angle as well as the fixed position will stop the torpedoing. This does negate the 3 position option giving you only an up or down position where in the up position the floatie is inverted. One could utilize multiple hole pitch angles to make use of the 3 positions but it would be advisable not to swap pin positions over open water hence the retainer clip could be dropped and go to the bottom never to be seen again.

For non sailing uses like flat water & level pedaling and standing you can keep them free to rotate and they work fine. For pedaling in chop with floaties the fixed position would be warranted.

Pics of the fixed Floatie:

_________________
I would rather be kayaking and think about work than to be at work thinking about kayaking.
A Thrill Ride is being dragged around in your kayak for 40 minutes by an extremely large fish.

Thanks for all this pioneering work on puncture proof sidekicks Apalach and Revo. I am following your results with great interest. Sadly I have not been able to source the lobster pot buoys downunder.
I may just have to purchase the sidekicks after all, but sailing the Oasis has taken a back seat to sailing the AI!
You are right about sailing conditions Apalach! I would love to be able to get the same experience from sailing the Oasis as I do from the AI but I am probably being a bit unrealistic. Even transfering the AI's mast, sail, aka and ama over wouldn't guarantee an AI type ride because of the Oasis hull. One of the reasons I purchased a second yellow AI was so the ama would match my yellow Oasis. That project though is not looking likely as in my spare time I just want to sail the AI!
I am waiting to see what Hobie does re the double AI.

Hey Kep,
Good to hear from you. Looks like you've been out having fun, although I've missed your posts here!

Hi stringy,

I am surprised you are having difficulty finding buoys. Several internet sites sell them. Do they not deliver to Australia? The weight is minimal so shipping cannot be that huge an expense.

here are a couple sites that sell them:
http://www.rainbownetrigging.com/catego ... =scbaswleo

http://www.kayakfishingstuff.com/store/ ... gory_Code=

http://www.lindgren-pitman.com/pc-239-9 ... -buoy.aspx

Web searches for bullet buoys, lobster buoy or foam bullet buoy usually yields good results.

Revo

_________________
I would rather be kayaking and think about work than to be at work thinking about kayaking.
A Thrill Ride is being dragged around in your kayak for 40 minutes by an extremely large fish.

Thanks Revo- I'll have to do a bit more searching.
Our dollar at the moment is way down so ordering stuff from US gets expensive.

G’day Stringy,
Sorry you have been having trouble locating a source for the buoys. Here is the main place that a lot of us use in North OZ: Hamilton Marine in Maine.
Online catalog at:

http://hamiltonmarine.com

Go to: Fishing Commercial: Lobstering: Page 2. However, these prices seem to be mainly for large lot orders. They used to sell them in lots of only two-four, etc., so KFS may be a better option, although they did not used to ship overseas. Check some of your own commercial fishing suppliers--I would be surprised if no one down there uses these buoys.

e-mail:
[email protected]

I also scanned the page from their print catalog that shows all the buoy essentials here:



They say to call for individual item pricing. I don't know if their toll free numbers work for international calls, but here it is anyway: 800-639-2715.
Good luck,
Dick

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