SV Cascadia

 Chapter 1 of Bikes and Boats, Better Together is here . Cargo bike hauling a cargo bike. We pared down our bicycle selections to just one cargo hauling bike for a wide range of reasons. A cargo bike is a lot like a bicycle saddle: one size does not fit all, and what worked perfectly in the past might not fit so well when things change. We replaced two cargo bikes with one electric-assist Hase Pino tandem. This is the second semi-recumbent tandem we have owned.  Bilenky Viewpoint custom semi-recumbent tandem The Bilenky no longer fit our needs at the time, but we really should not have sold it. Despite this repeated lesson, Wayne still tends to purge things the moment their usefulness isn't immediately apparent. We also would probably never go with another fully custom build: custom bike, custom problems. This issue applies to just about any mechanical thing, not just bikes from Bilenky. We combined the Hase Pino with a Surly Bill longbed trailer . Now, we can haul things that...

  Sanding and fairing, fairing and sanding... We're finally starting to put things back into the boat! Well, it's fairing compound to make the surfaces sealed and smooth. Fairing compound is a thing , right?  The inside of the hull is unsealed fiberglass, which tends to shed glass fibers and absorb liquids that land on it. In addition to the lack of interior coating, there are a lot superficial voids in the layup (think: nooks and crannies of your favorite English muffin) and globs of polyester resin from the original construction. We removed the 40 years of funk from the hull interior with a combination of TotalBoat EcoSolve, denatured alcohol, and copious elbow grease. The left test section was faired; the middle and right sections were not. We did a test with fairing, then high-build primer, and compared that with just high-build primer. Maybe we could get away with less work (HAHAHAHA!). The picture above kind of shows the difference. The area that was faired is way less ...