The Liquidlogic Ultimate Hook-Up Video Contest

Well its that time of year again. We are getting close to the time for the ultimate hook up.
Last year we had nearly 100 entrants. Right now there aren't any. Do you realize that that means you have a very good chance of winning a free liquidlogic kayak of your choice.

Here are the rules.
September 16th is the deadline for videos.
We Can Do Whatever We Want With The Video
We would like to have your video on a CD or DVD in Quicktime.
No longer than 1.5 minutes.
You may send a tape if you have to but it is far better to have it on a disk.
The Videographer and main paddler in the best overall video Win a LL boat of your choice.
There will also be 3 other categories that will recieve a deal on a boat for the videographer and paddler.
The Video Must Be Of Liquidlogic Boats.

The 4 categories are:
Best Overall Video
Best Creeking Video
Best Playboating Video
Best Humour Video

Last years winner.
Moe's Wet Dream
You can also see all our entrants from last year in our video gallery.
LL Gallery Page

If you have any questions send me an email.
Shane
shane@liquidlogickayaks.com

Young Guns at Skook Shooting for the Next Film.

Pat, Marlow and a host of others were out at Skook not too long ago and they sent in some photos that Tanya Shuman took.
The theme of the day seemed to be new shooting angles and fun with the Jet Ski. Tanya once again took some awesome shots. This is one of my favorite shots I have seen at Skook.

Cool shot of Pat doing it for the Jet Ski. Shows how close the boys are getting to the action right now.


Nice one Hal!
These two shots show how much these guys are having to really invest to make a video with a different look than what has been out lately. Kind of seems like it would be scary as hell with all those motors and noise and cameras pointed at you.


Here is a cool shot of James with his custom paint job either underdogging or helixing or something. James is actually also a great boat driver. He used to do alot of driving for the Canadian Coast Guard and he has shown me some amazing pictures of driving throught the surf in rescue boats. Maybe I can get him to send me some pictures. He also paddles pretty well.


The sad news lately has been that Marlow is out of action with a dislocated shoulder and is probably going to be in for surgery soon. We have had two big injuries to the team lately Yonton this spring and Marlow has been out most of the summer. I guess we are just going to need to take it a little easy. Nah!
Here are a couple links to the YGP page. The first one is to some amazing video clips of Pat and Mar.
As well as the home page link. Check'em out.
They will be premiering the new video later this year. All signs point to another amazing film. I can't wait to see it.
Young Guns Video Clips Page
Young Guns Video Home Page
Later
Shane

How To Make a Kayak Part 2

The next thing is assembling the boat after it has been molded. The assembly stuff is pretty self explanatory but the thing that most people don't know is how hard it is to do it and make the boat look really good. I have tried a few times to assembly my personal boats or the teams boats and I always get fingerprints all over the boat, or I scratch it by accident. These folks that assemble the boats for us are smooth, and know how to do it. Frank that is in the video was assembling the boats so fast I couldn't catch him doing a Jefe the whole way so I finally just waited for the next boat which was a lil joe.
Maybe you have it now check the serial number.

Of course Frank makes it look too easy. It takes alot of time to be able to do it as quickly and smoothly as he does. When Woody and I go up there and try to assemble boats they laugh at us. The thing that you can take from the video for yourself is how to take the walls out and put them back in as well as using a thin screw driver or ice pick type thing to line of the holes for the seat screw.

Here are the videos of assembling a kayak. It was too long to do in one video so there are two parts.
Assembling A Kayak Part 1 Click Here
Assembling A Kayak Part 2 Click Here

Later
Shane
Let me know what you want to see.

How a kayak is made. Part 1

I get a ton of people asking me how kayaks are made. I put together a video today about the first part of the process which is molding the kayak. Click the link below.
How do you make a kayak?

The mold is made of alluminum. The graphics and attachment points are put in and attached to the mold.
The graphics are placed in the mold and will bond with the plastic as it molds over the graphic in the mold. The metal inserts are screwed into place in the mold so that they will be molded over with plastic and become dry attachment points in the boat. Check out the size of the attachment points in your boat. We use extra large inserts so that our attachment points are super strong. This is a hugely important part of the boat because everything you tie to the bar or webbing or wire is attached to the plastic by these things. If its small it is much more likely to pull out of the plastic.


The plastic we use comes in a powder form. You can see its a light granular form. We weigh it out and pour it into the mold.
The heat in the oven cooks, or melts the plastic as it goes. The mold is rotated in the oven so that the plastic will slowly roll along the mold and coat evenly along the surface of the mold.
There are a few things that people don't know about plastics that are easy to tell when you look at them.
If the boat is brownish or slightly brownish on the inside it is over cooked.
If the inside of the boat is shiny it is over cooked.
If the inside of the boat is bumpy its undercooked.
The difference in strength of plastic is greatly impacted by how it is cooked.
If it is overcooked its brittle and ifs its undercooked it is also a problem with strength.
What we have actually found is that each color and each size boat actually needs a different amount of cook time.
So we have programmed each boat and each color of each boat a different cook cycle so that we can produce the strongest boat possible. One of the places this could really show up is in a multi colored boat. If one end of the boat is yellow and one end is orange you are cooking the boat only at one cycle time so therefore one part of the boat isn't cooked properly because of the different colors. That is why we don't mix colors.


The boat comes out as a hollow closed piece of plastic and all you have to do is cut out the cockpit area and you are ready for the next step which is assembling the boat. But that is for the next episode. I will do that later this week.
We have been working on our latest version of our new boats this week pretty psyched they came out great.

I will fill you all in as we get closer to the show. I have a couple more days here at the plant and then I am driving out to Salt Lake City for the show. If you have any questions let me know.
Shane

Patrick on the Ottawa River

Pat just sent me a few photos from his time on the Ottawa this summer. Nice shot.
I especially like the blunt grab and the tandem cartwheeling.
Later
Shane