Originally Posted By: tanstaafl.
I am trying to design an economical storage rack for kayaks. We'll be stacking the kayaks five high in the rack.

Presently I am looking for something to put on the floor of each storage slot to protect the hulls of the kayak. It has to be tough enough that a 50 pound kayak sliding over it won't destroy it, but most important it has to be inexpensive. The storage slots will be 32 inches wide by 20 feet long.

Recommendations?

tanstaafl.


How essential is it that you have support along the whole length?
Back in my whitewater days we stored our slalom kayaks (4m long) supported only in two places (about 25-30% in from each end. The supports were floor to ceiling square tubing with horizontal pipes/bars holding the kayaks. On the metal pipes/bars we had ABS? plastic pipes so the kayaks essentially rolled in (Or you could place/remove them sideways as the vertical square tubing at the end of the pipes were removable (locked in place to the top/bottom pieces with padlocks)).
With the side post in place kayaks were locked in since the rack was actually narrower than the middle of the kayaks were wide.
Code:
 ____________          
p|    I     |p         
 |    I     |          
 |====I=====|         
 |    I     |         
 |    I     |         
 |====I=====|             
 |    I     |
p|    I     |p
 ------------


something like that. p=padlock. Top and bottom bolted to roof/floor. Side posts removable once padlocks were unlocked/removed.

We had 2 1/2 of these (the 1/2 one against a wall, the full ones free-standing) 6 kayaks high.

'course, our kayaks were lighter, about 20-30 lbs, and shorter

Is it only sliding surface you're looking for, or structure as well?
Would you need to have the surface the full length or would say a slightly raised surface every foot or so do? Then maybe split plastic pipes convex side up...

Code:

o====o====o====o====o====o
imagine the o's as half circles on top of the structural surface


Kayaks would only be supported every foot (depending how close you place the half pipes) instead of whole length
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/Michael