Date: Wed, 29 Mar 1995 21:59:28 -0600
From: Raymond Tien <rtg0547@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu>
Message-Id: <199503300359.AA28459@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu>
To: baidarka@imagelan.com
Subject: builders manual
Previous discussion in this group regarding a builders manual
remined me of a little book I picked up a few years ago. It's
called, ALEUT KAYAK CONSTRUCTION by Wolfgang Brinck. For
those of you who haven't had the pleasure meeting Wolf, I can
only say he's a very interesting fellow. I met him at my
first Sea Kayaking symposium shortly after a freind and I
had finished building the 5.6m--neither my friend or I had ever
sat our butts in a kayak before we read George's book, Baidarka
and were compelled to build one. Anyway, Wolf sees the boat at
the beach, asks to take it for a spin and proceeds to do things
I never imagined a human could make a kayak do. He also brought
a couple boats to the meeting, both replicas of the Lowie
Museum vessel. As an aside, both boats have what I initally
though were the most gawd-awful paint jobs--until he quietly
explained that they were an abstract representation of his
cat and a fish---artists!. I should mention the wood frames
were top-notch with fine attention to detail. So he put
together a builders manual for a canvas over wood frame
Lowie Museum replica--complete with hand drawn/scribbled
sketches of key points. There are also adequate instructions
for paddle construction and paddling clothing. Especially
interesting is the combination paddling jacket/spray skirt
loosely based on authentic Aleut garb (but no tips on those
funny hats). If anyone's interested I can dig out the book
and try to find an address where you can contact him. The
book won't be found at your local B. Daltons--he was pawning
them off at a symposium a couple years ago.
Ray