Plastic Welding Seminar

Need to move that cleat to where you actually need it and wanna fill the holes? This might be something you'd want to attend.

Alder Creek Kayaks Tonight 12/12 7pm

http://www.aldercreek.com/Sales_&_Promotions/FREE-Winter_Clinic_Series-e3091-m12-y2011.html

Got this in my email and I'd like to go, but it's a bit more of a drive than I'm willing to make.

Ah shoot, that's awesome! I don't know if I can make it but I may try and sneak over there for at least the first hour.

I attended this last year and Sean does a great job of explaining technique with an actual application on a yak.  Also if there are too many folks, you can try a weld yourself.  Well worth attending.

Wear warm clothes as you meet in their repair shop.

I attended along with about twelve people that were, or seemed to be, Alder Creek regulars (isn't it funny how you can tell? And I've only been a SOT kayak angler/owner for about six months). The guy that did the repairs/welding tonight was David (an AC employee). He went thru the motions with various priced heat guns and repaired about four decent sized cracks, showing you don't have to have the top of the line, but the impression I left with is like anything else, the more you spend, the better off you'll be.

He also showed that welding the ol' school plastic is just about pointless as there is no adhesion between the base material and the rod or filler material. Toward the end of the evening, Andrew (another AC employee) held a raffle for some water proof cases, (for cell phones or GPS's maybe? Obviously I didn't win) and a $25 gift Certificate.

They're generally pretty brief classes as I had also attended the one a couple of weeks ago on Reading Charts and Navigation. So far, I would say they've been worth while and heard from others, the one I missed on loading your kayak for an ocean trip last week, was a good one too.