How-To-Fix a Thermoformed Plastic Kayak

"Oh, no, oh, no, my boat is broke. " I hear this every once in a while at my job as a kayak salesperson/instructor. Hardly ever does a soft plastic boat come in with a life threatening injury. Usually some nut has been dragging their Old Town Otter over a cement driveway. Well, duh, who's gonna win? The driveway or the soft plastic?

But occasionally someone will come in with a crack in their Eddyline or Hurricane thermoformed kayak. Now these boats are tough, they're made of a laminated ABS type plastic with an acrylic overlay. They're very hard to break, and since they're pretty most people don't drag them around. But accidents happen and boats will break given the right circumstances.

Paula's pretty yellow thermoformed boat went through a small tornado-type storm, a tree limb fell on it. It had four huge cracks and some missing pieces which she had in a baggy. Kind of like the finger you take with the guy to the emergency room. All kidding aside I had to tell her that the integrity of the boat would be affected because of the extent of the damage.. She bought another with the insurance money. And gave the body to me for disposal.

But, being a curious person I checked around for ideas on what to do with it. Repair was a possibility if I used the boat for a lake and only let my 12 yr. old use it. Another idea was to recycle the plastic. Huh? Apparently this stuff is reusable. Later I'll let you know if it worked.

In the meantime another boat came in with a cracked tail. This one was slightly damaged, cracks less than 8 inches and all near the end of the boat. I knew it would be ok to repair. Here's how I did it.