Tom

This is awesome – thanks for sharing!

Cool!

Hi Daniel, there are some whitewater pictures you might enjoy in the Pictures topic thread. I’m not much of a whitewater paddler yet myself, so I’ll leave the comments to others. Cheers!

Hi Sean – I know Bruce is in Alaska, but I’m not sure about your other questions. Cheers!

Hi Sean, I’ve posted pictures and a description of the form in Step 4.2 of the V3 instructions. Cheers!

Thanks for posting the links, Bruce – I was looking for one of these irons and couldn’t find it. It seems like it’s one of those designs that gets branded with different names, so it can be difficult to find if you’re just searching for it by the brand name. Hopefully the links will stay active!

Great shots, Patrick! The packraft looks good!

It’s certainly possible for the boat pressure to increase if the water is warmer than the air temperature, so give it a squeeze every so often when you’re paddling to make sure it’s not feeling over-stressed.

Thanks for mentioning the shrinkage issue – I’ll look into that. Cheers!

Hi Sean,

The stainless bowl should work – you might try wrapping some masking tape around it the “wrong way,” with the adhesive side facing out. The tape will hold the fabric in place as you work. That’s what I do on the wooden form I use, and it works well. If you have a jig saw or a band saw, you could make a wooden form yourself.

Cheers,

Matt

I merged this topic into the Help & Questions topic, but it messed with the order of posts… I’m trying to fix it, so far with no success 🙁

Hi Perrin,

Don’t worry – the zippers are very tight to begin with, but will loosen up over time. They’re especially difficult to open before they are mounted, because you have very little to grab on to. If you want to try them out before they are installed in the packraft, you can clamp one end of the mounting fabric in a padded vice or vice…[Read more]

Ah, yeah, I should have asked where the temperature sensor was, as there’s always a temperature gradient between the heating element and the surface of an iron. In theory, you could calibrate it to display the surface temperature, but it wouldn’t really be worth your time – once you find the correct temperature by trial and error, you can just…[Read more]

Oh, and the fabric melts at around 240 C, but you shouldn’t need to get anywhere close to that hot. Your DIY iron sounds cool! If you’re finding it takes too long to seal the wider welds, it might be worth adding an inexpensive model airplane sealing iron to your quiver – the large foot makes quick work of the tube-to-floor welds.

Hi Aaron – is that 215 degrees C or F? Assuming it’s Celsius, that should be plenty hot – maybe too hot, by the sounds of it. Maybe try around 200 C. You should be able to heat a small area, remove the iron, press on it with a rag for a few seconds to allow the weld to set, and then it should stay like that. You may see an occasional small bubble,…[Read more]

Hi Lyn,

The manufacturer doesn’t indicate a pressure rating so I can’t guarantee anything, but I’ve tested them up to about 5 psi (350 hPa) myself and they showed no signs of stress.

For reference, a 170 lb (77 kg) weight distributed over an area of 12 x 18″ (30 x 45 cm) on an inflatable seat exerts about 0.8 psi (55 hPa) – quite a large safety factor.

Great idea, Bruce! It looks durable and very easy to pack. Using a wooden form to seal the circular ends is a great idea, too – it’s a useful tip for anyone who wants to create round drybags of any type. Thanks for posting!