I have used a soft copper pipe (5/8” I suggest using a larger size). A friend of mine did the same basic thing with a dowel rod and it looks quite nice on a wood canoe. We glued them in with epoxy. Make sure that you drill from both sides of the kayak or your hole will be very crocked (at an angle).

Jason

: I drilled a 1 1/4" hole in my kayak with a Forstner bit and a LOT of
: patient drilling (I know this sounds BIG). Then I made a wooden pipe for
: it similar to what Ross did with the plastic pipe only out of pine.

: When I drilled the hole I first made a really small pilot hole from each side
: and aimed the holes at each other. Then I cleaned them up slightly larger
: to be one straight hole. The problem is that the Forstner bit doesn't have
: a very big pilot tip on the end to follow the hole easily if it gets very
: big. Be very careful when drilling through your kayak (do I really need to
: tell you that, probably not).

: Since I haven't set up my lathe yet, I just made the pipe on the table saw. I
: took 2 pieces of 3/4 " stock and epoxied them together and cut it so
: it would be 1.5 x 1.5 x length required to fit through the kayak and more.
: I drew a 1.25" diameter circle on the end and started cutting it down
: to just shy of the line (I wanted a tight fit). I cut the block at 45
: degrees to make an octogon out of it, then at 22.5 degrees to make it 16
: sided. Once it was 16 sided, I just knocked of the edges with some sand
: paper and cleaned it up for a nice fit.

: I used a 7/8" forstner bit to drill a hole down the center to make it
: into a pipe. I epoxied the pipe into the kayak.

: Once the epoxy cured I cut off the ends and rounded the edges of the pipe so
: it would have a smooth corner. Then I epoxied it inside.

: This 7/8 inside hole actually looks good with a 1/4" diameter rope
: through it, plus I can put my 1/2" diameter bicycle cable lock
: through it if I want to lock it up.