Hoping someone can help me identify the kayak pictured here (copy the link into your browser): https://www.dropbox.com/gallery/4107252/1/Kayak?h=f98844
Looking for info on make, model, year.
It is made of fiberglass, is 16' long, 26" wide with the opening being 36" by 25.5". Flat bottom with ridge along the length and foot pedal operated rudder that is attached by steel cables.
Thanks!
will this help?
By the look of the boat. it is at least 20 years old. It is will be a glass polyester boat. have fun paddling it. keep it on the flat.
could be a home-built one
The rudder definitely looks like an owner add-on and the boat itself could be a home-built or custom shop one, with very nicely done gelcoat. It doesn’t look like any commercially produced domestic kayak familiar to me (and I first started selling kayaks in the late 1970’s). I agree the form looks to be at least 20 years old, maybe closer to 30.
Possible match?
Thanks for the information. I dug a little deeper and believe it may be a kayak made by the company HollowForm that closed shop in the 1980’s. They starting making fiberglass kayaks in the early 1970’s and apparently turned the market upside down with these as they were much lighter than anything else out there. The HollowForms won every race and event at the time. This particular one looks almost identical to the River Runner model and had the rudder from the factory.
Anyone familiar with this brand or models?
HIN
Is there a Hull Identification Number anywhere on it?
The first three characters will be the manufacturer, which you can look up here: http://www.uscgboating.org/recalls/mic1.aspx
Hollowform
from reports by former owners, the Hollowform “River Runner” was “round as a log”:
"The first plastic kayak I paddled was a Hollowform RiverRunner…round as a log. And back then any company that began making plastic boats…oh we had a huge number to choose from…Perception, Hydra, and Hollowform…felt that they had to be round and they had to be 14’ long because that was what the Olympic boats were. "
It doesn’t look exactly like those Olympic slalom spec based 14’ boats though (I used to have one), with that deep hull, peaked bow deck and flattish bottom. Does it have much rocker? And I thought the Hollowforms were plastic, made (per legend) by a company that normally molded poly trash cans?
yowza
That is officially the biggest rudder blade i have ever seen in my life! You could cut someones leg off with that thing!
I don’t remember Hollowform using
keels. The boat looks like an early conception of a touring kayak. With that keel, I would keep it out of whitewater.
ID
I have not been able to locate any numbers any where. Where they on a plate attached to the hull or engraved into the hull? Any specific locations I should look?
HollowForm?
From what I read the HollowForms were fiberglass, but I really do not know for sure, just going on what I found online. I saw another River Runner online and it looked pretty close to this one. But yes, mine is not round at all and is 16’ long…
Sorry, you, and I, said Hollowform
when we meant Hyperform. Hollowform never (to my knowledge) made anything but poly whitewater kayaks. Hyperform had licensing agreements to make Lettman and Prijon racing and whitewater designs. The point I was making was that Hyperform never made “glass” kayaks with keels. For that reason, I don’t think your kayak is a Hyperform.
I have a Hyperform
Prijon, to be exact, and it does have a rudder with gas pedal style steering. The boat is fiberglass. Mine is a tandem, but I have not seen a stock rudder on any of the singles during my research. It says Hyperform on the stern, directly behind the cockpit, facing the paddler. The Prijon sticker has worn off.
So far, I have only seen fiberglass, and they have all been 14’. I will look to see where the HIN is on mine, I am pretty sure I saw it. If it is still there, I will let you know where it was located, maybe you can find an impression on yours.
don’t judge by rudder
I’ve got a vintage Aquaterra Chinook with what looks like the same rudder, clearly an aftermarket retrofit on mine and could be on yours too.