Skirt Repair

[stormcrow]

I'm starting to get 2 small holes next to my grab loop. Is there a quick fix or is it just time for a new skirt? Thanks.

Laramy

[RandyJ]

FIRST, if you have wear and tear up near your grab loop, take a real close look at your grab loop attachment and make sure the stitching is still strong and intact. It's a good idea to do this on a regular basis anyway. If things look suspect, time to replace the skirt. Otherwise...

Get some stuff called Aqua-Seal. Amazingly strong, flexible stuff. Find it at a boating store, scuba shop, or on line. If the hole is small enough, you might be able to just use Aqua-Seal alone. Better would be to use a small piece of neoprene as backing/reinforcement for your patch. Just find a neoprene drink koozie and cut it to shape as needed. You be the judge on what works best, but I'd put the patch on the underside of the skirt just for appearance's sake. as long as it doesn't mess with the seal around the cockpit rim.

There's some liquid called Cotol (don't know if this is acetone or what) that can be used w/ the Aqua-Seal. Acts as a both a thinner and accelerator for curing the Aqua-Seal, and can be used to clean the stuff off of fingers, tools, or whatever. I usually grab a plastic knife and a plastic butter-tub lid or wax paper, mix it together, and spread it on like peanut butter.

Probably more than you wanted to know. Hope that helps. Good luck.

[okieboater]

Randy's recommendation is right on target

I will add a few more things to check.

Make sure the grab loop tape goes around the spray skirt rand.

Used to be, that a major spray skirt manufacturer just stitched the grab loop only to the top of the spray skirt. I know of two instances where these grab loops just pulled off the spray skirt.

One thing I always do on my kayaks is add a emergency rip cord to the cockpit rim.

first find a thin section of nylon tape.

Second find a convenient spot inside the kayak next to the cockpit rim. I locate mine on the right side front quadrant. I have not had a kayak that did not have some neat place to tie the strap too.

Third run the tape up from inside the cockpit to lay over the cockpit rim. You may want to put the kayak spray skirt on to get this length right.

Fourth tie a knot of a size that is convenient for you to easily grab. What I do is put the knot close to the spray skirt so that it lays inside the groove that most kayaks have around the cockpit. The idea here is you do not want to have something hanging out that might catch on a limb etc. Trim off the end of the nylon strap and you are good to go.

Prijon used to put their own emergency rip cord on a few models. I think they called them poppers.

Another thing I often do is use plastic ties to attach a golf whiffle ball to the spray skirt grab loop. Many modern spray skirt grab loops have plastic tubing on the grab loop that makes them much easier to grab in an emergency - this is a good thing. The whiffle ball just makes it easier to get a grip on the spray skirt grab loop during a emergency.

sorry for all the information, but when most of us go for the spray skirt grab loop, we really need to get out of the boat ASAP. Any thing we can do to make sure the grab loop works as intended is a good thing.

[stormcrow]

Thanks for the info guys. I'm going to try and add a little more life to my skirt.