Had a fantastic afternoon on the water on Sunday.

Did my first balance brace - the new kayak does indeed make them very easy.

Spent a few hours surfing in very clean waves - after a good blow to set them up, the wind flicked offshore in mid afternoon as a front came through, and the offshore wind held the waves up beautifully into clean faces. As the tide dropped the rides got longer and longer.

Only downer was failing to roll back up from the one time I got tipped over. Bit disappointing after all the rolling practise. The problem was remembering what to do - I clearly need to practise setting up underwater after tipping in in lots of different attitudes, not just rolling over already set up.

No pictures sadly.

Lots of admiring comments about the kayak though. Less so about the paddle - much scepticism about whether it really had the power to deal with the tides we get round here. It doesn't help convince people when they try it for a few strokes and find it fluttering all over the place. Lots of interest though.

And another of Anna's Kayak alongside my Point Bennett.

Another picture.

Properly launched! It's now all outfitted with foot rests, seat, back band and thigh pads, same as the Point Bennett. You can blame Anna for the blue deck lines - she thought they would look good. I think she's now realised that my suggestion of black might have been nicer, so I'm sure I'll be asked to change them sooner or later.

So at the weekend we gave it some proper use.

Sat dawned calm, then at about 10:00 the wind gradually started to build. We had a fun paddle around lunchime, playing round the rocks in increasing waves, Anna in her new kayak and me in the PB. Then in the afternoon the waves had built more and Anna didn't want to play, so I took her new boat out for a play in the waves, and to try it out rolling. On Sunday the waves were bigger still, so it was just me again, until I met a couple of groups on the water and got chatting. It turned out that I knew lots of the same people as the second gang - hi James and friends - so hopefully we'll meet up again and paddle together. James is a part time boat builder and was already interested in building a wood kayak - I hope I can convince him!

So, after spending a few hours in the new boat, what can I say? - it's marvellous! My feelings have fluctuated a bit each time I've paddled it - as you can maybe tell from the earlier reports - but I was *really* happy this weekend. It's still early days, but current thoughts are as follows.

• It rolls very easily: I managed my first ever roll to the right on my first attempt, then proved it was no fluke by following up with my first rolls with the greenland paddle held in normal paddling position (unextended) to the left and right, again first time each way.


• I'm sure it will balance brace with a tiny bit more practice: I was only having to scull very gently to stay in place, I bet if I'd stopped I'd have balanced. Next time...


• It surfs like a champ. I can't claim the credit cos I've never had much luck surfing kayaks in the past, they've always tripped up or screwed off sideways, so it must be the boat. I never felt like it was about to trip up over a chine - maybe the deep V forward meaning the chines are softer than they might be helps? It picked up and surfed easily on the (decent sized) waves and swells in the open sea as well as in the waves on the beach.


• It has just the slightest tendency to weathercock if you look for it, but can be held in a straight line with no real noticeable effort when you're paddling.


• It behaved very well in waves, being easy to hold a course in any direction to the waves, including with a quartering sea from behind. Sure, it squiggles about a bit as big waves pass through, but there were no nasty suprises and overall it kept going in roughly the right direction. Still plenty more testing to do on this one in different waves, longer trips.


• As previously reported, it does carve turns, although not super strongly.


• Oh, it also attracts admiring glances!

I've been talking with some people - both on the kayak builders forum and the Delftship developer about whether Delftship did produce incorrect panel shapes or not. The most interesting (to me) detailed input has come from Toni V (thanks Toni) who took my design and moved the control points around while trying to keep the same lines. This was by hand so the result will not be identical, but it certainly looks pretty similar. Interestingly, the bottom panels as then developed by Delftship are *very* different shapes. For example, the ones I built from had a significant concave in the keel line at the stern. The new ones don't. I've sent these to Martijn, the Delftship developer - who is really friendly, thank Martijn - and will be interested to see what he makes of them.

You can see the differences even in the small picture above, where I've pasted in the linesplan and he panel development for the original and ToniV modified designs. Even at this scale you can see the designs are very very similar in linesplan but the bottom panels are significantly different. This is visible even though for some reason they are laid out different ways round for the two designs: keels together and sterns to the left in the original and sheers together and sterns to the right in the modified one. Check out the keel line towards the stern in both cases.

In both cases Delftship is set to show any developability problems in the panels. Interestingly it doesn't pick any up in the original (at this resolution) but does in the new model. Despite this he panels in the new model look a much more plausible shape to me, havin actually built the kayak now.

Click on the small picture for a full sized image where it is even clearer.

And while I'm at it, here is the final linesplan. Quite a V'd bottom, and very V'd ends. The keel line is slightly concave towards the rear, giving almost a skeg at the stern, aiding tracking. Lots of rocker, especially at the bow, for manoueverability.

I've been asked about the experiences I had with DelftShip producing panels which didn't work out right. So here's a picture. This is of the bow. The stern was very similar. In this picture

• the bottom panels are fully wired together
• the side panels are wired together at stem and stern
• accurately shaped stations are in place, temporarily glued onto the side panels to hold them in the correct position
• I've run a string from top of stem to top of stern, and measured down from it to the stations: this confirms that the side panels by themselves are forming prety much exactly the shape as designed
• as the picture clearly shows, the bottom panels are exactly the right length
• also, the panels are the right width at all points (eg panel width at the station exactly matches the length of the station edge)
• also, a photo from the top (not shown here) clearly shows that the chine (top) edges of the bottom panels are just the same distance apart side to side as the chine (bottom) edges of the side panels they should meet
• but the sides and bottom do not meet vertically!

The stern was if anything even worse: the design called for a very very slight hollow in the keel line to form almost a skeg at the back, but the bottom panels when joined again left a gaping gap to the side panels, and the keel line dipped down hugely.

Fixing this was not too hard in the end, with a long thin V of wood glued onto the top of each bottom panel at each end, then the bottom of the bottom panels trimmed (a lot!) as required.

I suspect this is due to twist in the panels. This does make them not fully developable, so it is fair enough for Delftship not to cope - and I was expecting a little adjustment to be needed - just not this much. I'm passing on this pic and the design file to the DelftShip developer - to whom big thanks for the free program to start with! - and I'll post any interesting developments here.

The new kayak is now even closer to being finished while not totally done.

• Coaming added: glass and carbon molded lip on a ply upstand.


• 6" RWO inspection hatches set into front and rear bulkheads, and bulkheads bonded in place.


• Brackets added to attach the backrest to.


• Yakima sliding footrests added.

All that's left is the final finish: sanding then maybe a final coat of epoxy if it needs it, then paint or varnish. Then add deck lines and bungees.

Further sea trials after adding coaming and bulkheads have shown the following.

• Previous comments about manoueverability, stability and tracking still apply.


• Still very light!


• I've now found it does turn when heeled, hurrah. Not super-strongly, and it turns very easily with a little extra effort on one paddle stroke anyway, but it does work. Good.


• The only negative though is that the secondary stability gives up quite quickly - at quite a low angle of heel - for me. I suspect this is due to the low freeboard: when the waterlevel is significantly over the side of the deck, there is no more hull to get into the water as I heel further, so no extra righting force being added. It's fine for my wife, the intended owner, though, since she is lighter.

Anna loves it which is the most important thing. It's just the right size for her, she feels much more at home than in the Point Bennett.

More pics to follow when the finish is done and deck lines and bungees are on, which will really finish it off.

Oh, and in related news, I learnt to roll a couple of days ago. I'd previously had two practise sessions (all in the Point Bennett).

• First session I just practised bracing back up from greater and greater angles of heel, but it was cold and I didn't feel like getting wet so that limited how far I heeled!
• Second session I rigged up a small dry bag as a kind of paddle float, gaffer (duct) taped to the paddle blade. Using this I practised hip flicking back up from horizontal with body mostly in the water and kayak tipped over on top of me. As I got the hang of it I reduced the amount of air in the bag more and more until there was none and I could capsize and flick up. Then I went for a few rolls, and got two but with no consistency at all.
• Third time I used my new Greenland paddle. First few practices at capsizing and flicking back up were unpromising - the lack of a large blade made this type of recovery harder. But I found I could scull and pretty much support myself. So I went for a roll and within a couple of goes had cracked it. The secret (for me) was recovering right back up while sweeping rather than trying to sweep until the paddle was at 90 degrees to the boat and I was on my side, then flicking up in a separate movement. After another go I could also fully support myself capsized, and recover, by sculling.

Having never had any tuition or seen anyone roll in the flesh I was pretty pleased, but I'm sure my roll is very poor compared to most! But I did then manage to roll first time with a Euro paddle and with a different kayak (the blue Dagger in the last pic) so I hope it wasn't just luck. I also need to learn to do it on the other side.

My three top tips from this process would be:

• Learn in shallow water so you can push yourself up with the paddle if you fail the roll. Even though I didn't manage to push up every time, it saved so much time and energy compared to having to wet exit every time.
• Wear goggles: being ablt to easily see what you're doing underwater helped me a lot, and wearing contact lenses I needed goggles for this.
• I'm sure it was worth learning the recovery from capsized before trying the full roll.

It should also go without saying that you've got to practise and be confident in doing a wet exit before you start, and despite me doing most of the above alone it would be much safer to have a partner, ideally one who knew what they were doing!

Another picture, showing the shape next to a Dagger Charleston 'plastic fantastic'. It is *so* much nicer than the plastic one:

• hugely lighter


• much more attractive


• much better tracking while nearly as manoeverable


• generally much easier to make it do precisely what you want - more delicate and more of an extension of the body.

Nearly done!

Nearly done! I finalised the design basically as per the previous post, and got cracking. I was slowed down a bit by the panels produced by DelftShip not being the right shape (it appears it can't cope with twist at all) but once I'd modified them a bit I was in business. Because of this I think the shape has ended up not precisely as I designed it - slightly less rise in the stern - but its pretty close.

This is the first test paddle. It's not finished at this point: it's fully glassed inside and out and I've just done the taping of the deck/hull seams with the masking tape still in place in this pic. But bulkheads, cockpit coaming, footrest and back band are all missing. But it floated so I thought I'd try it out to check it was worth finishing!

So, what was it like? Well, the idea was a kayak which was

• a bit shorter and lighter than most - check! (about 15'8" and (guess) 30lbs so far)
• straight tracking - check! On the limited paddle I've had so far I think I've cracked this.
• No weather-cocking - check! There was a decent breeze and I *think* this is going to be OK.
• stable - check! It is positively stable for me at rest, unlike the Point Bennett. But not too stable.
• Manoeverable - check! At least compared to my Point Bennett, which is very hard tracking, first trial suggests this one is much more manoeverable.

So I'm very pleased so far! However, one extra thing I'd like, but didn't really think about much beforehand, is the ability to alter course with leaning. I don't think this is going to work, boo. I wasn't tipping it much cos I didn't have the cockpit coaming on, so there's still a chance, but I don't think it will work even then. Loads of bow rocker and the chine above the waterline at the bow particularly are the culprits I suspect. So at present that's the only thing I think I might change if I were doing it again - otherwise I'm very pleased indeed. But longer sea trials will reveal all - and I'll add more comments when I've experimented further.

If you look closely you'll also see a Greenland paddle I've made, which I've now fallen in love with. So much lighter than my old Euro paddles (see previous grumbles!). I also love the ability to do sliding strokes, which I find I'm using all the time.

next project?

Anna needs a kayak of her own now, so I'm playing with designs. The current favourite is above.

Now all done! A poor picture of me, but it's the kayak that matters, right? The deck rigging really makes the kayak. Some strip built boats are real works of art and look great without it, but this stitch and glue one at least looked a bit dull and uninteresting when 'bare'. But now it really looks the part.

You can tell I'm feeling a lot more confident too!

Next job is a paddle to replace this old 3.5lb fibreglass one...

Also done by now is varnishing:

• The serious blushing was washed off with WEST water based cleaner and a lot of scrubbing.
• The lots of sanding: smoothing off the edges of the hull to deck joining strips and flattening and providing a key over the whole surfac for the varnish.
• Then 4 coats of System Three WR=LPU varnish, all with the hardener added for extra toughness. This went on OK with a brush, but was very atmospere dependent. The coats in the cooler morning were great, but by the last coat it was wamer and it dried a bit fast, before fully flattening out. My original plan was to then sand back and polish for an ultimate finish so his didn't really bother me, but I ran out of time before the paddling trip . I might still do that in future, but for now it looks OK without. Definitely a 5 metre finish though!

Time to go for a paddle! I look a bit more confident than I feel! This is the first high performance kayak I have been in, and much narrower than previous ones. So it felt pretty tippy to start with! After a few trips I now feel very comfortable, but the first few minutes were not very relaxing!

The kayak looks very bare here with no deck rigging. I still haven't drilled the holes and glued on the pre-made Maroske fittings.

Fitting out the cockpit. I used a commercial seat and back rest for speed and neatness. The back rest is tied at the side with thin line (red) to wooden fittings glued to the hull. These have a row of holes top to bottom to provide adjutment. The back of the back rest is tied to a wooden loop under the rear of the coaming. Initially I used the straps which came with the backrest, as seen here. But the plastic buckles slipped, so I've now swapped to thin line as for the sides.

This shot does no how the knee hooks I've now glued under the deck at the front sides of the cockpit. Again, commercial items available off the shelf for speed and neatness.

The seat is attached to the kayak floor with a velcro strip at each side. It stays fimly in place, but can be removed for cleaning. Also good for getting the position just right.

This pic shows the handle on the screw in day hatch and the cockpit coaming.

The coaming is all fabricated from more 4mm ply. The upstand is visible best in the previous but one pic, when the rim has not yet been added. This pic shows the shape of the completed coaming well.

All of the upstand apart from the 4" at the front is a single long trip of ply. The strip is straight and just under 1" wide. Bending the straight strip into the shape of the cockpit automatically mean that it twisted so as to always end up sticking up at 90" to the deck it was attached to. Very satisfactory - it look much better like his (to me eyes) than standing up vertically all the way round.

The curvature of the back of the cockpit was too tight for even 4mm ply to be bent to dry. A long soaking in hot water added flexibility so it could be bent to fit. Rather than trying to attach a quickly drying and stiffening strip into final position straight away, I roughly wedged it into place with various chocks of wood then left it to dry. I ended up with a dry and stiff again strip in basically the right shape, which was much easier to work with for final positioning and glueing.

It was glued in place inside (rather than on top of) the deck with superglue. This was much easier than using epoxy. Using accelerator means you can hold the strip in place by hand which is a lot easier than trying to devise a clamping system.

The upstand curve at the front was too tight for even hot water softened ply. Commercial bendable ply would probably work. I made my own by using my thinnest (finest kerf) saw to cut parallel lines half way through the a piece of ply. I again used hot water bending and holding in shape until dry to set the rough shape - this time around a paint tin of about the right diameter. A straight strip does not work here. Instead I made the bend ply much wider (and longer) than I needed, and offered it up and cut it to shape after it was dry and holding its curve.

The rim was comparatively easy. It was made in two pieces, one for each side. You could use the same template as for the cockpit opening to get most of the shape apart from the front (with appropriate allowances if necessay for whether the upstand is glued on top of or inside the deck, and whether the im ontop of or ouside the upstand). I just made a simple cardboard template. The very front is quite curved as you can see in the picture - again hot water bending was needed. Not easy as the bend is right at the end of the piece so there is no leverage, bu perseverance paid off. (Could you glue the two sides together first to get more leverage? Yes, if you can be sure that the ends match perfctly. This requires an accuracy basically impossible to achieve with the cardboard template, it can only be achieved with the pieces lined up in their final positions - which needs them to be bent to shape. Catch 22). The rim was glued on top of the upstand, again with superglue.

Being monocoque wood the rim was remarkably stiff already. The whole was further strengthed and reinforced with mini-fillets inside the two 90 degree corners at the top and bottom of the outside of the upstand, and two layers of glasscloth. The glass cloth was applied as bias-cut strips about 12" long.

• Two very narrow strips - about 3/4" and 1" wide - reinforce the outside of the upstand to hull joint and run most of the way up the upstand.
• Two similar but slightly wider strips reinforce the outside of the upstand to lip joint, and cove the bottom of the lip. Leave these sticking out past the lip until nearly set, then trim back, but still leave sticking out 1mm.
• Two much wider strips cover the whole of the top of the lip, inside of the upstand and run round to under the deck. At the outside of the rim these meet with the reinforcement on the bottom of the rim to form a strong fibreglass edge.
• Note - before glueing the rim in place I'd sanded down the edge so it tapered to about 1mm thick only, to end up with sharper edge to grip the spraydeck and so that the top and bottom fibreglass layers could be made to meet and reinforce the very edge.

This approach to the cockpit rim was much more work than the method Duane recomends for the Point Bennett. Was it worth it? Well, it looks great (I think - check out the shape in he picture above) and is lighter. It was also fun to build. Which would I do if I build another? That's depend on whether I have a deadline to hit!

As previously descibed I went for wooden hatches. This picture shows the fabricated wooden screw in day hatch cover. Construction is prety obvious:

• All the material is 4mm ply, the same as the rest of the kayak.
• The lid turns just 45 degrees to screw up.
• The lid is the circle cut from the deck, to the bottom of which is glued a smaller diameter 'spacer' circle, to the bottom of which again is glued the 'castellated circle' with the four sticking out sectors for engaging with the 4 sticking in sectors on the hatch lip. Glueing this up is actuall the final step in the contruction - see later.
• These sticking out sectors on the lid and sticking in sectors on the lip are sanded to have 'ramps' where they first engage, to provide the 'screwing down' action.
• Do think about how long the ramps should be though: if the ramp is full length along the sector, with the sector at 0mm thick at one end and the full 4mm thick at the other end, then screwing the lid on 1/8 turn unil the sectors are fully ovelapping each other only pulls the lid down half as far as if the ramps only extend along the first third of the sector, with the remaining 2/3 being the full 4mm thick. Either would work, but would need different spacing to end up with the hatch lid flush to the deck.
• It is not obvious in the picture, but one sector in the lid and cut out in the lip is bigger than the others to ensure the lid only fits in one orientation.
• Also invisible on the underside of a sticking in sector on the lip is a small wooden 'stop' to limit the rotation of the lid. These two points mean the lid always ends up with the grain matching how it was cut from the deck.
• The lip is also construted from 4mm ply, with a ring under the deck of the same inside diameter as the hole in the deck (pretty much invisible in the picture.
• Under that is another ring with a smaller inside diameter. This forms the bottom of the channel into which the hatch gasket will late be stuck to fom the seal. I should have chosen a better bit of wood for this - a blackene knot is clearly visible bottom left. I planned to paint it when I chose the wood.
• On top of this is the inner 'inside castellated ring' which mates with the lid. Again, I should have chosen better wood, with a defect visible just to the ight of the hatch lid in the picture. (Scrimping on materials in an unfortunate habit of mine I must break!)
• Everything is epoxy coated and bonded. The final step, after the lip was fully installed, was bonding the hatch lid together. The hole in the middle of the lid is there as I first screwed the layers of the lid together from below, into the wooden handle on top (visible in late pics). This was without glue, and allowed me to fine tune the thickness of the invisible disk between the lid and the 'castellated circle' bottom piece. Tuning this, and careful sanding of the engaging sectors, allowed me to get the lid to end up absolutely flush with the deck with the required level of tightness or looseness of the lid when full screwed on.
• A note on tightness vs looseness: after experiments I ended up with the lid just very slightly loose and rattly when fully screwed on, and relied on the pressure of the gasket to make it a tight fit which would not wok loose. It's worked well so far.
• You can't see in the picture, but one side of the mating sector is covered in epoxy mixed with carbon powder for smooth sliding.

I haven't been using the kayak for long, so only time will tell whether this poves to be a good design or whether sand gets embedded in the threads and causes trouble.

The other hatches have very similar lips, with the channel for a sealing strip, just without the sticking in 'screw hread sectors'.

The other hatch lids are just the cut outs from the deck with 1/4" ply cross ribs standing up near the front and back. These ribs serve two purposes.

• Holding the lid to the required shape. This is flat for the rear hatch, but curve for the front hatch.
• having hooks on the end to accept the elastic hold-downs.

The rear hatch was very easy to make. The deck is flat, so the whole hatch rim can be assembled off the kayak and glued in place fully formed. The hatch lid stays nice and flat when cut from the deck, so the two cross ribs have flat tops - easy.

The front hatch was harder. Recall that the plywood at this point is rather tortured (bent to a shape it doesn't really want to adopt). This shape is only formed when the deck is attached to the hull - which was why I had attached it before cutting the hatches. But, cutting a hole for the hatch will change the stresses in both the remaining deck and the hatch lid, so both will change shape and the lid will no longer match the hole. But the lid matching the hole is the whole point of flush wooden hatches. The following scheme worked very well, starting with the deck already attached to the hull, fully glassed etc.

• Mark out the location of the front hatch (on masking tape on the deck)
• Mark out 4 lines across the deck: two inside the hatch, a little (1"?) in from the front an back of the hatch, and two outside the hatch, about 1/2" infront of and behind the hatch.
• The two lines inside the hatch mark where the under hatch ribs will be, the two outside mark where under deck ribs will be. These will run the full width of the kyak.
• These ribs under the deck and the hatch will hold each in the exact shape they are in now before the hatch is cut, so they will match.
• Make cardboard templates of the curve of the deck along each line. You'll end up with four cardboard templates each with a slightly different curve. Mark them so you know which is which!
• Cut a rib from 1/4" ply to match each template. Mine were about 1" deep in the middle for the hatch ribs, and 1.5" deep for the under deck ribs. The under deck ribs are longer since they run right from side to side of the kayak. The under hatch ribs are as long as they can be while fitting in the hatch rim. My rim has a 10mm wide channel for the seal then a 10mm wide wooden ledge for the hatch lid to sit on, so the ribs have to end 20mm away from each side of the hatch.
• Cut the hatch lid from the deck. (Both deck and hatch lid do indeed change shape as predicted - I've not been doing this work in vain - hurrah!)
• Glue the ribs into place under deck an under hatch lid.
• Fabricate the hatch lip in situ: First glue on the ring around the opening, then the channel bottom piece then the 10mm wide ledge piece. Lots of clamps. This could not be made off the kayak and added in one piece later as the rear hatch lip was owing to the complex curve of the deck.
• Try the hatch lid in place. Breathe sigh of satisfaction that it lines up to within about 0.5mm height-wise all round the edge.

That's more than I expected to write about hatches, but they did take up a bunch of time and thought. If I wanted flush wooden hatches I would do exactly the same again next time for front and rear hatches - unless I got tempted to try magnetic hold-downs - but I'd need to do some more research / thinking about how to let the magnets into the hatch lids before trying that. I won't do another screw wooden hatch until enough time has passed to test the current one thoroughly, just because of the extra time involved.

[Sorry about the mixed units above, it's just the way I think. MM make sense to me much better than inches up to about 1/2", then inches are better!]

Easter 2007. A long weekend at our family place in Wales and I was determined that I'd get afloat.

Deck is now glassed and on. If you look carefully you'll see that in the end I didn't do the deck and the deck to hull joint wih a single piece of fibreglass, I used a separate tape for the seam. So I could have taken the deck off after glassing the top and made the Maroke fittings in place. Oh well.

Note the white-ish colour on the deck - that's the blush on the epoxy. It took some serious cleaning of later when I came to vanishing.

Nice weather and a chance to work outside - bliss after the cramped garage.

I've seen various comments about the difficulty of lining up deck and hull, and how to hold them in place. I understand the problem for strip built kayaks, but for stitch and glue like this I just used exactly the same technique as for all other seams: stitch, epoxy between the stitches, remove stitches, fill the whole seam with epoxy filler, sand smooth.

Lots of progress has been made by this picture.

• The front hatch lip is made and just waiting a sealing strip in the channel.
• The wooden screw in day hatch has been made and is also just waiting its sealing strip.
• The rear hatch is still a hole in the deck - although the hatch lip has actually been made off the kayak and is waiting to be glued in place.
• The cockpit coaming upstand has been fitted.

More on hatches and the cockpit coaming coming up...

Deck Fittings. Lots of thinking time went into the deck:

• What sort of fittings for deck lines and bungees.


• Whether to have hatches, and what sort of hatch lids.


• What order to do the build in.

Constructing the deck and fitings was made more complicated by the warped plywood deck of the Point Bennett. It is a very simple and neat design, but the plywood is being forced into a shape it doesn't really want to be in, and the final shape is only determined when the deck is forced onto the hull. In theory it must be possible to prop the deck up while off the hull in the right shape - and this is what Duane suggests doing. However, I decided that I wanted flush fitting wooden hatches, and felt that the deck would have to be in *precisely* the right final shape when building them so they ended up flush - and that could only be done with the deck on the hull.

Why did I want flush wooden hatches?

• Despite Duane's own kayaks being painted and looking fantastic, and despite deciding I would paint mine when I started, by this point I was starting to like the look of the wood and had decided to varnish my kayak instead, and I decided a flush hatch would complement that best.


• The commercial hatches seemed very heavy, and I really wanted light weight: if the kayak was too heavy to be fun to carry down to the sea on my own it would not get used, which would defeat the whole purpose of the build.

So, I'd arrived at needing to attach the deck to the hull before making the hatches. The next consideration was attaching the deck to the hull. The deck was glassed underneath already, while off the hull, and while propped to vaguely the right shape. For neatness I reckoned I could do without a separate glass tape around the join - instead I could attach the deck to the hull next, and then cover the deck and do the deck to hull joint with a single piece of glasscloth. This sounded like a fine plan. But what about fittings for deck lines and bungees?

Screwed on fittings which look to be used on Duane's Point Bennetts look great on a painted hull, but wouldn't suit a varnished one I decided. After research and playing around with various recessed options I came across 'Maroske' fittings, which I decided were the answer.

These are described as best being constructed in situ, before the deck is attached. But I wanted to attach the deck before glassing the outside, and that would mean glassing over the fittings. Cutting the fibreglass off the holes later would be fine, but I could imagine the 'U's filling up with resin during the process, which would not be good! So I decided to construct the fittings on scraps of ply, off the boat. The picture shows a string of them under contruction, with others already done beside them.

Starting to think about the rigging. I didn't want big, heavy end pours. This hardwood dowel will take the bow handle. You can't see, but I've actually pre-drilled the dowel in a pillar drill beore angling the ends to fit it into the boat. The sides aren't yet drilled - they'll be drilled out with a small drill and opened up with a file to match the hole in the dowel later.

Why? I thought it might be hard to drill a neat, square hole across the kayak when it was all done. It would probably have been fine!

Note that the dowel is epoxy coated already - it's going to be hard to do hat when the deck's on!

Overall, a lot of time gets spent on cutting little bits like this to shape and epoxy coating them - two layers cos the first sinks in - before fitting them.

Sanding the filler coat smooth. Dull, but needs doing. Keep going until there are basically no shiny spots left - here I've just got the rounding along the keel line to do. Actually pretty quick if you use decent glasspaper. I did it all by hand in one session, not much over an hour I guess.

Lovely shape! This was followed by a final epoxy coat as thin as I could manage.

Out of order but I've just remembered. Before glassing, I finished the bow and stern with a hardwood strip glued in place and planed to shape. They end up as a nice mini-accent if you go with a varnish finish, and are just more pleasing than a large epoxy and filler fillet.

Digression over, and back to building. Glassing the outside was much easier than glassing the inside - I don' know why I was worried about it!

Masking tape covers up the last 1/2" up to the sheer, to leave a bare wood section for the final deck to hull joining tape. I haven't done tests so don' know whether this actuall is any stonger than just glassing all the way to the edge.

Here the fill coats hav been applied as soon as the glasscloth epoxy has pretty much set. I used WEST system with the normal (medium) hardener. Sets pretty quickly, you hav to work fast. Also blushes horribly, which makes it even more important to get the fill coats on before it sets properly, or you have to clean the blush off before doing the fill coats - and cleaning the blush off a layer of unfilled cloth wih all its 'weave grain' would be hard.

On the plus side though for this stage, this epoxy is pretty thick and viscous, so few fill coats are needed (1, or 2 in places). A plastic squeegie is the perfect thing for fill coats.

Speaking of which, I used a combination of brush and squeegie for wetting out the cloth. I tried a roller for about 10 seconds, but this epoxy is so sticky that the cloth just stuck to the roller, which is a disaster. But brush and squeegie were fine.

Poor diagrams, but hopefully they will show why I went for sloping footrests.

The top row shows how small feet and big feet end up when jammed into a kayak. (Whadda ya mean, they don't look like feet?). Tests with my feet and Anna's prove it! The red dots show where ideally the foot would rest on the footrest: note that, counter-intuitively, small feet actually want the footrest to be *higher up* than big feet.

Small feet are generally attached to shorter legs than large feet. So for a kayak which may be used by many people, that suggests a sliding footrest which is lower at the bow (further from the seat for longer legs) and higher further back. See the bottom diagram.

In this bottom diagram, the second advantage can then be seen. With feet in their natural position the sole is not upright, but slanted. A horizontal footrest slide means a vertical footrest: not super-comfortable. But the slanted footrest slide means a slanted footrest, and more confort. Magic. I love it when a plan comes together.

The bolts for the footrests in position, with some extra layers of fibrelass to reinforce the area.

A shot from the outside would show the bold heads set into the wood. I used coachbolts to get the thin head , with more filing to thin it further and filed notches in the edges of the head to let the epoxy grip it well. It ends up level with the outside of the ply, ready for the hull to be glassed on the outside.

Why are the bolts not level? Good question. This was one idea I came up with which I haven't seen elsewhere and am very happy with. The bow is to the left in this picture...

Inside now glassed. This was the first time the kayak felt strong enough to sit in, so naturally we had to try it out!

The shape is such that a single piece of glasscloth can be used, with no folds or pieces cut out. Keep working at it and it will fit in one. I should have taken a bit longer moothing it out: the bow an stern, whioch should be the hard bits, are good, but there are a couple of small wrinkles along the inside of the chine in the cockpit area. Nothing to really worry about though.

The cloth isn't much wider than the kayak, but I still deliberately put it on at as much of an angle as I could - maybe 5 degrees off straight? I did the same on the outside. This gives two advantages.

• More threads crossing the keel line (cos some of the fore and aft ones do as well a all of the side to side ones) and so more strength and probably abrasion resistance.
• It is easier to mold the cloth to shape at the ends with it on a diagonal.

Note the size of the fillet at the bow. Adds lots of strength without neeing a huge end pour later. Also easier to do the glassclothing than with a tiny fillet.

Apart from just trying it out we are deciding on the location for the footrests. I have large feet and was slightly paranoid about fitting them in, so wanted to mount the footrests right against the inside of the hull, with the bolds set into the wood of the hull - so wanted to mount them from the outside before glassing the outside of the hull.

Anna is trying one out in the picture. Shoes back right, cos we'd change into wetsuit boots for a perfect test!

In retrospect there was plenty of room as you end up pointing your toes naturally anyway, so no need to mount the bolts this way.

Inside ready for glassing. Looks like a kayak now!

At this stage I departed from Duane's instructions. This was deliberate at the tim, and worked OK, but if I build another I will follow somehing more similar to Duane's approach (still not certain about the screw!)

His approach is to glass the outside of the hull, with the forms still in the inside.

I was nervous about my first glass clothing for 15 years (I built a surfboard many years ago) being on the outside and visible. I was also not sure about the scheme for having to have a screw holding the bottom panel to the rear most station (where it is quite tortured), and needing to remove the screw mid-way through the glassing. If Duane says it works I'm certain it does - he has built many more kayaks that I have! - but I just couldn't visualise it. So I came up with a scheme to let me do the inside first.

• Add reasonable sized fillets between the stations (can't take them out yet, they are defining the shape of the hull). This is seen above, with masking tape each side of the fillets for neatness. The fillets are epoxy mixed with WEST filleting blend.
• Remove the satations and fill in the gaps in the fillets.
• Glass the inside.

This worked, and held the shape perfectly, but was more stages and so more work than glassing the outside first.

Here you can see I have epoxied the joints together between the wires and am starting to snip the ends off the wires prior to removing them. Next step will be to put a fillet off thickened epoxy along each seam. I used epoxy mixed with brown microballoons as the colour match was reasonable and it is easy to sand. Aim to fill the seam proud in one go. I used a cleaned out old bathroom sealant 'big syringe" to apply mine. Then round the corners and generally sand the outside smooth.

This stage is very satisfying - just cleaning up the corners like his suddenly makes it look like a kayak.

Nearly fully wired. Now upside down to make it easier to sight along the keel like to look for bumps and hollows. Slight adjustments with sandpaper run between the mating edges help to get it all even. I only had to add packing betwen them in one place, and very thin packing at that. The lines as published were obviously very fair - good job, Duane.

Note the minimal working space again! You can build a kayak without the huge workshops you often see.

This picture shows the working setup.

• A ladder formed the bacic building table. Since the shape is formed by he panels and the stations, there is no need to hold a load of stations solidly lined up with each other, so no need for a rigid strongback. The ladder is beidy, and it's fine.
• lots of intenal stations help form the shape of the hull. These are essential. They are as specified in the design.
• Aligned with two of the stations I made external 'cradle' foms. The cut outs were simply the same shape as the internal forms + the thickness of the plywood. These worked very well and were the main place for the kayak to sit through most of the construction. At times the panels were wired onto these external forms to hold them into shape.

The kayak is only slightly more progressed than in the previous picture. The sides are wired together at the bow and stern then sat on top of the bottom, ready for wiring on. The external cradle forms really help here, holding the sides in place.

I'd been thinking about building a sea kayak on and off for a few years, but never got round to starting. I never seemed to find the right design, and somehow wasn't confident enough I'd actually get started to make it seem worthwhile to send off for plans. However, on one of my occasions research sessions I came across the Point Bennett, and it seemed to be what I wanted.

• Stitch and glue, so materials readily available (good, light, know free wood such as Western Red Cedar is not avaiable from most local timber merchats in the UK)
• Designed for the correct bodyweight and size (I'm over 6' but relatively light for my height at 75kg / 11 stone 11 / 165lbs)
• Short enough to fit in my garage which was designed for a 1930's car and is less than 18' long.
• Good tracking.
• A pleasing shape, with upswept ends and raked bow and stern (raked bow but plumb stern as seen on some models didn't appeal).
• Availavl right there, and free!

So that was it, decision made - then wood purchased and construction started immediately. Serious lack of floor space in the garage slowed down the initial glueing of pieces into long scarfed panels, as I only has the space to do one at once. But by the second weekend I had pieces cut out and the hull bottom wired together - on the rih above - it's taking shape already! This aspect of stitch and glue is very satisfying - the hull shape starts to appear very early.

The photo above shows where and how I had to do the cutting out, due to lack of space indoors. It was all cut outside, on the floor with an electric jigsaw with timbers under the panels to raise them to blade height off the floor - they're visible under the left hand, deck, panel. Note the improvised knee pads: the floor is hard and cold!

Laying out the lines took a little while, but cutting was surprisingly quick and easy - if requiring serious concentration. Get the cut lines wrong and the whole kayak ends up the wrong shape. Go steadily.

I couldn't find any copper wire of the right guage in the local shops for stitching. Faced with a choice of buying electrical cable and stripping the insulation or going for steel wire, I went for steel wire, in the form of pre-cut plant ties. Sadly these were the wrong temper - springy rather than soft. A quick barbecue sorted that out: heated to red hot then allowed to cool left them nicely malleable.

I started building the Point Bennett last autumn. Gentle progress saw it hitting the water at Easter, but with no varnish or deck rigging, and only temporary cockpit outfitting. That's all now done, and it had its maiden 'finished' voyage last weekend in Trearddur Bay, North Wales. My wife is showing it off above.

If I'd been organised I'd have kept a blog throughout the build. But I wasn't, I'm just starting now. I'm putting up these pictures and notes of the build in the hope that they will help others at some point, as I have been helped by various resources through my build.

Biggest thanks to Duane Strosaker for designing the Point Bennett and for making the design available for free. If it had not been sitting there ready to be used I would never have just gone out one day and bought some wood, and started.

So, having seen the finished article, the following posts will jump back to the start of the build and follow it through.