: Hi Brian,

: You may be right. When I first come on this board I posted this train of
: thought and most didn't think it was feasible. But I've got to try this,
: and its no extra work since I want the side storage anyway.

I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with what you're doing, just that it may not help in the way that you hope it will. Reducing the volume of the cockpit is a good idea, whether it adds any floatation/stability or not.

: I believe I
: remember a canoe company that had floatation in its gunnels as a safty
: feature to keep it from rolling when swamped.

There's a big difference between a swamped canoe and a swamped kayak, assuming that you have proper floatation in the ends of the kayak in the from of bulkheads or floatation bags. A canoe can easily fill to the gunwale with water. In that case, floatation along the gunwale will make it more stable, since it's in the water. In a kayak, the floatation in the ends will keep the gunwales above the water, so floatation there does little or no good (unless you can make it lighter than air.

: Also, I saw a story on the
: on the web of a man that thinks the paddle float rescue is dangerous
: because its complicated and the kayak/canoe is unstable after its filled
: with water, especially for children. He said a flooded but stablized boat
: wasn't hard to paddle to shore and that blow up sponsors are much safer
: and children can use this system with very little training and had no
: trouble paddling to shore.

Tim Ingram is a psychotic liar whose only interest is in lining his pockets with the contents of your wallet, and he will resort to anything to do it. You'd do well to stay as far away from him and his products as possible. If you want to see his true colors, visit the rec.boats.paddle newsgroup some time.

Having said that, EXTERNAL sponsons will increase the stability of a kayak and would be of benefit in CALM water. In rough water, they probably won't do you any good and may do more harm than good. Despite what Timmy-Boy says, sponson installation/inflation takes considerably longer than a paddle float rescue and far longer than an assisted rescue. All of these take much longer than a roll.

: According to the book "SEA-KAYAKER,DEEP
: TROUBLE" you have less body heat loss if you are sitting in a flooded
: boat rather then being in the water, even though you may feel colder. The
: bottom line is you may have a half hour to rescue yourself in cold water
: before your body shuts down. The book had many stories of people getting
: back into their flooded unstable kayaks and falling right back into the
: water, mostly because of the rough conditions. Now, I try to visualize my
: kayak sitting in the water not flooded. If I try to get in from the side
: it will roll and flood. But when flooded the floation will take hold and
: the side of the kayak will be buoyant, just as if you grabbed onto a life
: jacket floating in the water. You can hardly sink it. This is how I see
: it, and I will do all of the tests this summer and post pictures on the
: board. I don't have any experience paddling a swamped boat as you do so I
: may be completely WET.

I understand your reasoning, but suspect that the difference the floatation makes will not be nearly as dramatic as you hope. In this case, I'd be happy to be proven wrong. Please let us know how it works once you get it in the water.