Fluid Kayaks

Introduction, Design Philosophy, People, Outfitting, and Video

Introduction...

Fluid offers you some of the most advanced kayaks on the planet. And this is no hype. They just say it like it is. On Fluid products you will find no gimmicks, just pure functional design blended with pleasing aesthetics, to give you the taste of unlimited fun.

Fluid is situated in the small town of Parys in South Africa, right next to the sometimes-mighty Vaal River. Development takes place in their R&D facilities at the factory, and first prototypes are tested on the Vaal River with its infamous Gatsien wave. As they get closer to the final design, they move around between Africa's bigger and scarier rivers for intense paddling and testing. Just to make sure you are happy with the hull performance of the kayaks, they spend lots of time on the waves of the Indian Ocean.

their attention to detail and stringent quality control, from the raw material supply to final detail, assures that they have confidence in their products. They have the conditions to test the products to the limit, to make sure that you have peace of mind when you really need it.

Design Philosophy...

A great design is not simple, it's functional - Joe Stumpfel

They are a bit paranoid about words like "innovation", "thinking out of the box", etc. In this modern age, these have become buzz words, used by everyone and anyone who do something slightly different. Two questions need to be asked when anybody make such a claim. The first being: "is it really different from what has been done before?" The second: "does it work?"

At Fluid they look at things differently. Everything that needs to be designed on their boats, are designed from basic principles. This includes hull design, deck design and outfitting. Sometimes they arrive at something completely different, sometimes the differences are more subtle. They don't tire themselves too much about the first question on innovation. Being different is not the end purpose of what they do. They care more about the second question: "does it work?"

They consider being based in Africa a blessing, where they are a bit isolated from the other manufacturers. This makes it easier for them to work from first principles, instead of adapting someone else's ideas. They set certain parameters for every boat they design, and the boat won't go in production until they are sure that they have achieved the optimum for every parameter. Sometimes it takes a bit longer than they promised, but the wait is always worth it.

They also don't believe in gimmicks. Pure functional design is all that counts, blended with pleasing aesthetics. And they try not to hype our boats too much, the proof is in the pudding, as they say. So when they say a boat like the Flirt is the loosest boat on the market, you can be sure it is. And when they say it gives the biggest controllable air, you can be sure it does.

Thoughts on boat sizes...

It is quite obvious nowadays that boat models need to be available in different sizes. They decided on three sizes for most of our model ranges, which seems to be the best compromise between paddler sizes and economics. What they do differently, however, is to stretch the limits of their sizes a bit. In a nutshell, this means that the smallest of the three sizes in one of their ranges, will typically be a bit small than their competitors' smallest sizes, and the biggest of the three sizes will typically be a bit bigger than their competitor's biggest sizes. This means that the really small and large paddlers, who have not been catered for historically, will now have a boat that actually fit them. They still design every boat to work for a wide weight range, so that the combined effect means that they can cater for a larger range of paddlers with three sizes of boats.

They decided that codes, indicating volume or length (inaccurately), are quite meaningless to identify a boat's size as part of a range, unless you know the full range well. So they are using the letters S, M and L, to identify the Small, Medium and Large version of their range of boats.

The People at Fluid...

The company is headed by Celliers Kruger, one of South Africa's most accomplished whitewater paddlers, who happened to be a mechanical engineer with an excellent understanding of fluid dynamics. He is the Managing Director of Fluid and also the designer of Fluid's products, and his vision will ensure that you always get the cutting edge in kayak design.

Marinus Coetzee has a Masters degree in Communications and an Honours degree in Finances, making him the perfect person to be the Financial and General Manager of Fluid. He met Celliers in 1993, but to Celliers' shame, he only managed to get Marinus into a kayak recently. He took his paddling career further after joining Fluid early 2005, and you will find him on a river when he's not in the office.

Magda Roscherr is Celliers' Personal Assistant. Which means she is involved in everything from Marketing to R&D to Projects to Production. Count on her to keep all the loose pieces together.

Sarel Kruger is in charge of Projects. One of his most difficult accomplishments was raising Celliers, but apart from that, he is an expert in building anything that is of a mechanical or electrical nature. The Wizard.

George Mokhobo is Fluid's Moulding Supervisor. George was Fluid's second employee, he helped shape the first boats, he helped to build our first rotomoulding machine, and today he is in charge of the machine. He calls the rotomoulding machine his baby, and makes sure that every boat moulded is of first class quality.

Joe Groenewald, our Assembly Supervisor, makes sure that every kayak we send out of the factory is of first class quality. He is a competent paddler and guide, and understands what is needed to keep other paddlers happy.

Outfitting...

The outfitting is like all things Fluid: simple to use, effective, lightweight. No gimmicks.

The seat and spine is rotomoulded as a single unit, with a variety of kiss-offs and grooves on the bottom half. The combination means reduced weight, maximum stiffness, and a huge area of hull support. The movable hippads and adjustable backrest are all fixed to the seat unit. When moving the seat forward or back, the hippads and backrest move with it.
The seat rails are made of HDPE, and have 5 holes for easy adjustment. To move the seat, you only have to take out the two plastic knobs in front, bend the rails a bit to release the bolts from the holes, slide the seat forward or back, slot the bolts back into a set of holes and screw the knobs on again. Simple, but very effective and fool proof.

Fluid's backrest is probably the simplest concept on the market today, and highly effective. It gives maximum support to the lower back, and has no sewn on pieces than can break. The backrest can be adjusted using quick release ratchets from IR, which are mounted on the seat pan.

The pre-shaped hip pads, mounted on the sides of the seats, are fully adjustable. Just loosen the knobs, move them in and out or change the angle, and tighten the knobs again. No need for gluing extra foam in. So easy to accommodate paddlers of different sizes. It's also possible to pull the neoprene covers off to glue some more foam on, if needed.

The thigh braces are fully adjustable, moving forward and backward. To move, simply take the top screws out with a flat screwdriver or coin, and loosen the knob at the bottom.

We all know a playboat needs fins for super fast carving. So we experimented with fins on the Flirts till we got the perfect spot to fix the fins to the hull. Next question: what is the perfect angle for a fin? The truth is, there is no perfect angle, it all depends on the type of wave and what you want to do on it. For some waves and styles you want them dead straight for lots of speed, for other waves and styles you want them toed in so that you can zip around on the wave. So there you have it, fin plates that enables you set your fins up dead straight or toed in at any angle up to 20°. The plates take industry standard wake board fins. We're also working on our own fin designs, which will be available soon.

The flexible handles, made of stiffened tubular webbing with 1000kg breaking strength, are fixed to moulded in inserts. Apart from being strong, they are also very comfortable to use.

A standard drain plug finishes off the outfitting. The plug is sunken in to protect it from damage, and positioned in the stern left corner for easy drainage.

THE WAY PADDLESPORTS GEAR SHOULD BE.