• Buckhorn Creek
    Spillway
    Blown Up Raft
    Packraft in Backpack
    It has been a few months since I used my raft since it has been raining a lot and I have been using my hard boat. This past Saturday though, water was low so I was able to do some exploring with my packraft. I ended up hiking about a mile to my local lake’s spillway. I had to wade another quarter mile or so through the creek and under a neat t…[Read more]

  • Update on the Toobseal. I’m not entirely sure if it’s due to having put too much in the valve, but now my stern seam strip is starting to tear away. My suspicion is that too much of the Toobseal worked its way between the tube and seam strip fabric and maybe since it’s made to plug air leaks, wedged its way in which caused the separation. I’m not…[Read more]

  • I think so, but I’m not sure how uniform I can get the inner coating. I’ll really have to test it out on the water and give it a few days to see how effective it is. I’m optimistic, but I’ll give an update once it’s been really put to the test. The product is $55 and I bought it from Utah whitewater gear online. I also poured some into my seat…[Read more]

  • I used a product called Toobseal, which is a runny, acrylic based sealant. I put about half a bottle of the 32 oz in through the Boston valve, filled it up and rotated a few times. It found the leak and so far appears to have sealed well. Time will tell if it holds up well. I had previously had a slow leak that I couldn’t find, but figured it o…[Read more]

  • I’m kind of new to the inflatables world, but just finished a Telkwa recently. It was a fun experience, but I decided I probably won’t build another kit anytime soon due to the time it takes and attention away from my wife and kids. I recently discovered online, however, that NRS used to build a whitewater inflatable kayak out of TPU in the Bandit…[Read more]

  • I was initially thinking about trying to figure this out, but I was a little DIYed out and just bought one from MRS. Not sure how well it’ll work, but I’ll report back. I’ve found almost all of my leaks and fixed them but I’m still finding I need about 5-10 breaths per hour. If something like this ends up on the store, I bet it’d be pretty…[Read more]

  • It was. Class 2 and nothing catastrophic. I did rip the hole that held my seat in place to the floor. Seat is fine, but I’ll need to rig something to hold it in place. Have a slow leak that I need to work on. I had added bail holes near the seat but need to add a lot more based on my water test. I posted one of my laps on the Facebook page. I…[Read more]

  • zachschiada replied to the topic in the forum DIY Accessories 7 months, 1 week ago

    You maybe could add some sort of foam balls or something like that to inflate and then deflate so that they conform to your foot spot. I’ve got Jackson happy feet in my ww kayak with this. Most have mixed feelings about it, but I love the way it conforms to my feet in my kayak.

  • Ok, I ended up doing something that really hurt to do. I performed surgery on my raft. I made an incision and accessed the tubes, welding them back to the floor. I then applied seam sealer to avoid them lifting up. Since I cut into my mostly finished raft, I added a name tag and phone number contact like I do in all my whitewater boats. If it’s h…[Read more]

    • When I built my raft, I thought I’d use the zipper access to store things. It’s been far more useful as a way to access the interior area and turn the boat inside out.

  • I see now. It’s the floor separating from the tube fabric. I’ll try flipping it over tonight and ironing from the bottom up with parchment paper.Valve view

  • <p style=”text-align: left;”>Sorry for so many messages on here, but I’m a day before my on water test for my telkwa and I’m noticing that I have a very large bulge in my floor where 4R and 4L tubes are. Due to the air bulge on the opposite side at the reinforcement strips, I’m assuming that I need to further reinforce the strip with the floor…[Read more]

  • Thanks Matt. I’ll keep an eye on it and report back.

  • I’m still in need of adding seam grip to fix a leak that I have, but while I’m waiting for the seam grip to arrive, I went ahead and added attachment points for outfitting with the d rings and my back rest, seat and thigh straps. My question is that the attachment points don’t seem like they would hold up as well as I’d like. I’m especiall…[Read more]

  • zachschiada replied to the topic Seam Sealing in the forum DIY Packrafts 7 months, 2 weeks ago

    I tried today with the seam grip having set about 18 hours. It worked fine. I even tried directly on the seam grip without the parchment paper and it didn’t look too bad after, but I’d recommend with parchment paper over without since I just tried one small area and suspect there’d be some melting if I were to do it elsewhere. Definitely my prefe…[Read more]

  • zachschiada replied to the topic Seam Sealing in the forum DIY Packrafts 7 months, 2 weeks ago

    So I got a little carried away with seam sealer and started coating all of my seams with seam grip before fixing what should have been done with my iron when I inflated and found leaks. I read on here that I can go over sealed areas with my iron using parchment paper once it cures, but is that after the 8 days to fully cure or can I do so say 8-12…[Read more]

  • I used this one and it has been great for small sections and I suspect it’s easier for things like the attachments, but after having completed the bulk of my telkwa (still diagnosing and fixing some leaks), I wouldn’t recommend it. The obvious reason is like you mentioned that it takes longer, but also, I found myself rewelding sections more tha…[Read more]

  • zachschiada replied to the topic Oops! in the forum DIY Packrafts 8 months, 1 week ago

    Thanks Matt! Good to hear. It’s been a fun project so far, a good balance between building confidence and learning something new. I’ll update once I finish/test this thing out.

  • zachschiada replied to the topic Oops! in the forum DIY Packrafts 8 months, 1 week ago

    I think it can be fixed, but when pulling my floor back through the installed tube for 3R, I pulled too hard and ripped the floor about 1.5″ where there is a gap cut out for the space between 3R and 2R. I patched the teared area with spare fabric (floor fabric spare on topside, seat fabric spare below), but will this cause any problems…[Read more]

  • I’m thinking about buying a Telkwa in the future once I get one of my 3 WW boats sold. I’m wondering if a cheap iron like this one on Amazon will work. I’m looking for one that can double up for plastic kayak repairs. If anyone thinks this wouldn’t work, I’ll just get one of the already recommended ones, but I was hoping for double…[Read more]

  • zachschiada became a registered member 9 months, 1 week ago