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Cape
Falcon Kayak and other small
boats
PO Box 582 Manzanita OR
97130 (503) 368-3044 evenings
brian@capefalconkayak.com note: this email sometimes drops emails, if you don't hear back please mail capefalconkayak@yahoo.com |
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 My latest surf/sea kayak experiment, The Rhino Testing my longer sea kayak design, the L.P.B. click here Skipping work, what I did today instead click here Nothing to do with kayaking whatsoever! ...but fun nonetheless. Lis and I spent a week drying out in the slot canyons of southern Utah. Enjoy! click here Salvaging logs by kayak click here On the road again... Building kayaks in North Carolina click here NEW! MULTISPORT RACING KAYAK CLICK HERE People often ask about the photos on my website so I put together this tutorial to show how I 'cheat' my way into good photographs! photo guide Step by step, kayak building class photo documentary click here It is a shame that most people only know about Greenland kayaks, here is a page crafted by kayak historian Harvey Golden. It shows the broad diversity of traditional arctic kayaks. click here Kayak Building Classes I was invited to teach kayak building at the 20th annual Delmarva paddlers retreat. click here January kayak building class at Valley Forge, nice photo documentary Building SC-1's in San Francisco, more cool pictures Building kayaks on the East Coast photos of big, weird moths Building kayaks in Sitka, Alaska kayak fishing photos Building a driftwood and scraps kayak photo documentary click here Trips Some photos of a Greenland rolling demonstration click here I spent a week touring the San Juan islands with friend and traditional skills expert Kiliii Yu. click here This August myself and Mike Higgins spent a week paddling the Southern Oregon coast. Happy holidays, check out my adventure of kayaking to thanksgiving dinner click here I took with a friend to the desert canyons of Utah to kayak on the Green River 12 hours in a dry suit click here Paddling with Wally around Cape Falcon click here A week of paddling with my friend Alec click here Paddling the Pacific on a cold winter day click here Autumn fitness training, gorgeous surf photos click here 22 mile Oregon Coast training paddle, awesome pics click here Slots and sea caves click here Photos from PC-TIKS surf event held at Manzanita, Oregon click here My awesome winter paddle day with Rich and Bailey click here Rich Delong sent me more photos from Hawaii Winter attempt to circumnavigate the Big Island click here Man rolls truck over kayaks, view the damage click here Traditonal Replica Kayaks Fram Museum # 176 Greenland kayak click here 1935 Sisimuit replica kayak the best Greenland kayak I've ever built. 1926 Sisimuit West Greenland kayak replica click here early 20th century East Greenland kayak replica click here New 1931 Greenland replica kayak delivered the old fashioned way click here Mid 20th century West Greenland replica click here 1850s Aleutian double kayak click here 1834 West Greenland kayak replica and great surf photos click here Modern Kayaks Read about my new kayak design for 2008 the F1 modified fiberglass squirt boat The Vulcan surf project SC-1, SC-1 page Building the SC-1 Ginnyak II, my own design, simple, fast, light, manueverable. Other types of boats The lightweight of a kayak, the speed of a canoe, the skin-on-frame Adirondack guide boat! Photo documentary of voyaging my row/sail boat in the Sea of Cortez click here To see this boat being built click here Outrigger sailing canoe click here The Blue Canoe click here The experimental boat click here Tutorials Beginners guide to using a Greenland Kayak here foam thigh hooks adding a rub strip installing a back band installing deck lines how to skin a kayak Davids' foot pedals |
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Falcon Kayak Pretty good kayaks, at not-too-bad prices I’m supposed to tell you that a skin-on-frame kayak is better than any other type of kayak. The trouble is, I don’t really believe that. I mean, you are talking to a guy that owns six plastic whitewater kayaks. I believe that every kayak has a proper use, a glass kayak will carry a lot of gear and last forever provided you don’t bang it into things, a plastic kayak is indestructible, if not a bit sluggish and heavy. A well-designed skin kayak is all about sweet paddling, which is how I got into this whole thing. Seven years ago I built a skin-on-frame baidarka, and even though it paddled terrible, it only weighed twenty-five pounds and I ended up taking it everywhere I went. It was beautiful and I was surprised by how tough it was. It was also fun and easy to build. There are few things as rewarding as building your own kayak in a week. Still, I am a paddler first and a craftsman second, so I had to find a way to make one that paddled as good as it looked. I started building kayaks, one per week, exploring the art of kayak design. Copying traditional Eskimo kayaks and my favorite commercial kayaks I came to recognize skin-on-frame as a powerful tool for design evolution, setting me free to explore wherever my imagination took me. Since then I have built, taught, and helped build over 300 skin-on-frame kayaks, and these days things are looking pretty nice. Professional, refined, strong, and super lightweight. During that time I’ve stayed true to my roots as a paddler, testing my kayaks on the exposed and unforgiving Oregon coastline. More than a few boats have ended up in the scrap pile, and that is part of the beauty of skin-on-frame prototyping. Unlike the professional designer who has months, sometimes years, and thousands of dollars into a design before the first prototype is even tested, my designs are conceived and tested in weeks, and if it doesn’t paddle exactly how I want, I don’t have the same pressures to push it into production. Each skin kayak is unique, there is no mold or form, which means it is easy to make changes in the design to suit the individual, something that is impossible with mass production. The coolest thing about skin-on-frame is that you build it yourself. Sure I can sell you a finished kayak, but first I’ll try to talk you into a class. For 1200 dollars and one week of your time you leave with a paddle and a kayak that you made with your own hands. We build in my beautiful workshop on the Oregon coast, enjoying a relaxed pace with plenty of time for long lunches and evening walks on the beach. You will have an opportunity to tour my off-grid organic farm right across the street, and when the weather is nice, we try to have a potluck barbeque. When you are done you not only have a kayak, you have a connection to the place and people where it was made. It’s these connections that are missing when you buy a kayak outright, whether it’s from me or from a shop. Is a skin-on-frame kayak right for you? That’s a question only you can answer, what I can tell you is that no one works harder than I do to fit and test the best skin-on-frame kayaks available. Don’t take my word for it though, come out to the shop and paddle a few boats, you just might fall in love. Brian Schulz |
