Maker Trevor Akin has been building boats for himself for years. Now with the “Kidyak” he’s built a child-sized, skin-on-frame kayak for his daughter. This is a sturdy, light, inexpensive and relatively easy to build kid version of a traditional Arctic kayak like those used in Western Greenland.
He began by working with plans from his friend and fellow boat Maker, Dave Gentry of Gentry custom boats. It’s built in a way similar to cloth-over-frame aircraft, popular during the early aviation revolution, but the design goes back to traditional methods of the Arctic’s aboriginal people.
The frame is cut by using patterns that are traced from templates onto heavy paper. Once the patterns are cut they are applied directly to marine plywood.
The patterns are then ready to be used as a cutting guide for the wood frame, cockpit, knee braces and other wood structures of the boat. Lightweight woods are used for stringers and they can be assembled without screws using lashing and or glue.
Akin explained that by drawing out a design and then building a model he could create templates that could be scaled to size. Using this method, a full scale boat can be transformed into a customized kid-sized kayak.
A departure from the traditional covering utilizing skins and sinew from marine animals, Akin used a synthetic fabric skin pulled over the frame. He lashed the frame with artificial sinew. The 8oz polyester cover is paintable and kids can help design and customize the look of their boat.
Akin completes this build with a beautiful, lightweight, traditional style paddle that will be easy for kids to hold. The boat itself only weighs about 15 pounds and can easily be transported by the kids to the water. This build takes 20-25 hours and once completed is perfect for fishing and paddling across lakes and slow moving waterways.
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