Chuck,

That is seriously cool.

Where did you get the dimensionsal information for the drives?

How does it handle?

Laszlo

   Hi Laslo, I have built 4 other kayaks with Mirage drives so I had one on hand to measure while I built this one. It is very fast and comfortable. It always draws a crowd when we launch. I couldn't be happier.

   It must be fast. It looks like you installed roll bars. How quiet are the drives? I have an old Hobie Outback with the Mirage drive and if I'm not careful it makes a pretty good thump at the end of the stroke.

   Chuck, great looking double, could you be kind enough to give us more pictures of the completed craft? Specificly I'm looking at the seating you used, with back troubles I'm looking at modifying up a boat for myself since I need a larger backrest than most for support, and yours looks like it has just what I need. 

Looking at the drive modification itself, did you do the homemade peddles to keep the water level below the top of the lip or was that to place the drives further forward for some ergonomic reason?

Would love it if CLC offered a "kit" option to build a well for the Hobie drive systems in their boats. Hint-Hint...

   To Catboater, the drives are silent , the hull does not contact the fins .

To SSG Casper , I will add some photos of the seats this week. My pedal design allows the well to have enough height to keep the water out of the cock pit. The wells can be built to meet the underside of the deck. I have done that on earlier kayaks.

Chuck,

Any chance that you could put up at least the major dimensions of the drives/wells? I've been toying with the idea of putting a Mirage drive into my WD12 for years, but I haven't found any dimensioned drawings. It'd be nice to know if it's even feasible.

I do like the solution that you came up with - the domed hatches for the drive wells. Don't know if that can be made to visually work with the WD12 deck shape, though.

Laszlo

   Hi Laslo, I will get that together and post it later this week.

Here are a few shots of the seats , steering , and mounting of the Mirage Drives inside the well. We have foam cushions that sit on the seat bottoms.

And I thought that it was a cool boat based on the earlier pictures. Wow. Amazingly nice boat.

Laszlo

   Chuck,

Thank you for the additional Pictures, have to say that you sir are a craftsman! Those seats are simple yet look like what I have been thinking of doing on my planned build this winter. I was kicking around between puting a Hobie Adjustable seat (like on their angler model) or building something similar to yours though I was thinking of using Sunscreen fabric for the back and seat area's held in place with heavy bungie cord web on the edges, much like the "Zero-Gravity" Camp Chairs that are out there. Did you just use heavy cord/rope or is that a bungie material?

I was wondering how you did the Rudder, (or if you had one) with your feet on the Miriage Drives, thanks for that added detail. I do have a question though, is there room in there with the Mirage peddles to have a standard kayak rudder peddle system as well for those days/times you aren't using the Mirage propulsion? Would be much more complicated for the wiring of the rudder, but would make for a mer versitile craft...

   To answer your question, I used cord that was not to strechy for the seats. As far as having the foot steering I suppose that depends on the model of kayak you are using. I am considering adding foot steering to my Mill creek, ( it has a mirage drive) . I have been using a large sled kite with it and I do not have enough hands to enjoy the ride. I have not worked out how I might do this but it should be fun.

   That it swesome. Do you have any idea what speed you travel at comfortably in you mill creek?

I've been wanting to put Mirage drives in a design like this for years but wasn't sure how to do it, thanks for sharing this!   Any other details and pictures of the build would be most welcome!

Brent

It looks like the entire chesapeake double is strip planked (hull and deck)? Did you do this from plans? What is the weight of the hull?

   I built the sides of the hull, with bead and cove strips, in the flat on a long table. I used a plywood router jig to do the yellow cedar inlay. I made a practice hull out of scrap wood first to make the jig and make sure that this would work before I tried it on the cedar. The bottom is plywood per the Chesapeake plans. I then stiched the hull together . I mounted the mirage drives in the hull temporarily so I could figure out what the deck should look like. Then I built a fixture like the ones used for stripped kayaks and set it in the hull. I stripped out the deck, finished both sides of it then glued and glassed it to the hull. I do not know how much it weighs but we use a kayak cart to move it around and we put it on a trailer to take it to the beach.