: I'm starting to look at designs for a kayak for my wife. She likes
: my Night Heron well enough, but I think that another design
: might fit her better. I'm slightly intrigued by Rob Macks'
: Firestar. I'm curious if anyone has built it and paddled it
: enough to give a review, particularly in comparison to other
: designs you may have paddled.

: Speed is important, but not as important as handling. She is not as
: strong as me, so tracking is much more important for her, and at
: the same time, it's got to turn fairly well. Stability in chop-
: sometimes pretty steep chop- would be good. Wind can be an issue
: as well.

: Does anyone else have any ideas for other high performance designs?
: Is an Outer Islander too big for her? I have heard of someone
: doing a straight-up 10% reduction in size of a NH and getting
: really good results, but I'd rather work with something as
: designed. A hybrid or S&G is totally not out of the
: question.

: m
Hi Mike,
I built a Firestar a couple of years ago after a significant amount of reserch on various designs.Í have been padling an 850 mm wide 6000 mm long double barge with my wife and child (in the middle cockpit ,storage compartment) for years so this was an important descision...
I chose this over Rob´s Northstar because I am determined to stop growing at 180 lbs and I had half an eye on my ¨dainty¨wife using it.I was relieved to find this boat was, as others have said,fast and well able to cope with steep chop.It actually gets better when there is some chop as opposed to mirror calm and the hull speed can be increased where chop alows the hull to ¨fly better.
The directional stability is too good but I extended the stern blade as I (was) going to convert the excess (100mm) into a rudder.
I have to carve the turns.I have done around 40 ¨´sea´´ trials in as much variation of conditions as have been presented.When most of the wind waves have a white crest ,say 20 knots? The boat is reluctant to be brought about into the wind.Several big sweeps from a GP in quick sucsession will bring the nose round and once way has been made the hull locks onto the new course.I have not loaded the boat with clobber yet so have not explored the weight distribution forward to help with weather \ lee cocking.I believe the windage is pretty low the bow being low profile.I enjoy paddling besides pre breaking shore waves and despite the steep wave fronts aproaching impossibly high the boat just goes up and down and the waves pass under and break only a few meters later.Surfing is wild and great fun.
I built a second identical boat (offering Rob his royalty) so my wife could join me however,it seems the devorce maker double kind of works in reverse and the years of me paddling a barge in the rear cockpit means my Firestar is much much faster than hers...I am now looking for another design, to keep me amused,and the NH fully stripped was my second choice back then,so maybe I will progress that.Cheers from P.