: Oh, the picture??????? Well, that's my Walrus 18 1/3'er. No, I didn't typo,
: that's 18 and 1/3. I set my forms to make an 18'er and forgot about the
: 2" x 4" end blocks sticking out on the bench, a couple of inches
: on each side. That's what happens when you improvize as you go. Heck,
: what's a couple of extra inches among friends!!

Just don't try to ship it on a Canadian railroad. Their web page says they'll take a canoe or kayak up to 18 feet long as additional personal baggage for $50 if it travels on the same train as a paying person. An extra 4 inches? You might get hit for additional freight. Or maybe you can convince them it is a rounding error in metric conversion

BTW I still haven't found any published fares for US rail shipments of canoes or kayaks, or size/packaging requirements.

: or... Uh, well, anyone who was
: into the conversations a while back.... Oh yeh, Shawn Baker... do any of
: you guys remember where you found the fabric, glue and stems for the float
: bags a few weeks ago. Gotta get that underway as well. I want to make them
: myself so they fit into the bow and stern areas and the filler tubes and
: valves extend up into the cockpit area for ease of filling. Appreciate
: whatever you can remember of that.

Check out Mcmaster Carr (www.mcmaster.com). when you get to their home page type this into the search window: heavy weight vinyl You should get three listings for some vinyl coated polyester fabric in the 17 ounce range or up. Catalog description of this stuff looks like it is what I would want to use for the skin on that Walrus. 60 inches wide. It comes in colors (no painting) It can be glued with vinyl glue, or heat sealed, so seams should be leakfree. And I suspect it will heat shrink a small amount to pull out puckers, but this I'd have to try. You might want to get a few yards and build your float bags from it. Experimenting on them will tell you if you want it as the skin for your hull.

Why bother with valves for your inflatable bags? just use long flat tubes made from the same material as your bags. blow or pump air into the end of the tube to inflate. You can fold over the end of the tube and clamp it shut with a bulldog paper clip.

PGJ