> Paul, thanks for the thought-provoking questions and suggestions. My first
> thought was that a stitch and glue kayak would be easier for a first
> project, although aesthetically, the strip kayaks are more appealing. I
> have a friend with wood working tools and we would be working together,
> hopefully clearing out some space in the basement. What is it like to live
> with the epoxy fumes?

> I have thought about the boat-building vacation idea, and that is
> appealing as well. I stopped by the Wooden Boat School, and they have a
> course in which you build your own Chesapeake 17 from their kit. I'm just
> not sure that that is the boat for me. I checked out the URL for the
> course by Greg Redden, which sounded good, but I didn't see any current or
> future offerings for that class. This is definitely an area I will be
> exploring.

> So at this point I am pretty much thinking of a wooden kit. What do you
> think about a strip kit as a first project? Is stitch and glue a better
> option for a novice?

> Thanks for the help!

> Linda

Ansers to your questions, in more or less reverse order:

Stitch and glue better for a novice? Maybe. If you buy a precut kit then it will certainly be fast and simple. There are a couple of major names who produce S&G kits and they seem to hate each other fiercely and passionately -- but from what I read from the people who have built their boats, they are both good companies to deal with -- as long as you do not mention the name of their competition -- and builders of either brand of boat seem to love their boats.

If you are building from plans you must cut your own panels from your own plywood. This is not hard, it just takes more time. With full size palns you paste them on and cut on the lines. with reduced plans you enlarge them, and then treat them as full size plans. For a beginner or a person who jst wants a simple boat, this is a lot of extra effort. For someone on a tight budget, this is a trade-off of time for money.

Stitch and glue construction does not usually require a strongback (a long narrow workbench). Once the pieces are cut to shape they are rather quick to pull together. Tools needed are few. Few skills needed. This is a VERY GOOD option for a beginner, but I am not sure it si a better option than strip building.

A strip kit as a first project? I think this is a fine idea. The possible shapes that you can make are unlimited, so are the posible designs and modifications to those designs. This wealth of design freedom can be overwhelming. Strip-built boats have more parts than stitch and glue designs, (all those strips !) but they are very easy to assemble. If you are big enough to use a staple gun you are big enough to build a canoe or kayak.

The strips that you get are generally ''square'' They should be uniformly thick (anywhere from 1/8th inch to 1/4 inch thick is common, just make sure they ALL are the same thickness) and uniformly wide. The edges may be cut into interlocking curved shapes ( one is called a bead and it nests inside a cove) or they may be straight edges. The length of the strips maybe anywhere from 4 feet long to a few feet longer than the length of your finished boat.

Many strips go on without modification. You just glue the edge, lay them on the forms, slide them next to existing strips, and shoot in a few staples to hold them in place until the glue sets. Other strips are custom shaped to fit certain areas. Usually these are the ends where the boat gets narrower, and you have to shave a little wood off of a strip. It is about as difficult as sharpening a pencil in a pencil sharpener. In fact, the boat is probably made form the same type of wood that is used in a pencil -- cedar. A hand plane does a good job very easily. If you think you have made a mistake, grab another strip. A strip you screw up on can probably be used in another location, so don't worry about excessive waste.

Putting all the strips together can (correction, make that WILL) take longer than assembling a stitch and glue kit. In addition, you need to spend time setting up a strongback, and mounting the frames that you build on. That is, if you get a kit that has the frames pre-cut. Otherwise, you must also cut the frames. We are talking time and materials here. These are the ONLY reasons I advise in favor of stitch and glue kit for a first boat.

Exceptions: If you have a friend who has already constructed a strip-built boat and you can borrow the frames they used (or rent them) then a strip built boat becomes competitive cost-wise with a stitch and glue boat. If you already have the tools available so that you can cut your own strips, AND you have the frames, then you might build a stripper for less money than a stitch and glue kit. About $40 to $50 worth of cedar or pine is needed for making a kayak or canoe. Maybe a little more or less depending on where you get the wood and the length of the boat. A stitch and glue design is made from plywood, usually marine plywood. A 4 x 8 foot panel of this is in the $30 and up range. Most kayaks use 2 to 4 sheets of plywood. That is about $60 to $120 for materials. Kits provide these materials precut, and you are paying for the kit maker to do the work of cutting those parts. Waste, tool costs, etc. are all borne by the kit maker, who passes these costs along to you. In exchange you get good parts that are ready to assemble.

I have heard it sad that you build an automobile from 'parts', and you build a house from 'materials'. To extend this analogy, you build a kit from parts and a stripper from materials. A kit provides you with the more expensive 'parts', a stripper MIGHT be built with the less expensive 'materials'.

If you have the idea of making several boats from the same design, the *second* time you use the forms for a stripper your construction time and costs will drop. If yo plan to build several boats from plywood, you can drastically cut (averagea) production time by stacking several sheets of plywood and cut parts for two or three boats at the same time.

For a single boat, go with a kit.

As for epoxy fumes in the house:

Use the epoxy outside of your house and there will be no problem. This is a boat, not a coffee table. While some people have built them in the living rooms of their apartments, they still have to get the thing outside to float it, so they might as well paint it and epoxy it outside. For $30 you can get a 12 by 12 dining fly (with poles) at most K-marts or sporting goods stores. set ti up on your driveway and work in its shade for the few days it will take to assemble the hull and paint or varnish it. Start on a Friday night, work through the weekend and you'll have a lot done by Sunday night. A cheap tarp will cover your work over night and keep the rain and dew off of things.

Decide where you are going to store your baat when it is finished. Try to work in that area to build it, too. If you plan to store it in the rafters of the garage, move the car out and get to work. I work on my deck.

As for designs: If you are looking to travel with this, and do some camping, plan of a capacity of your weight plus 100 pounds for gear, water, and food. If you are camping in an area where fresh water is abundant you can plan on 50 to 60 pounds of gear and food, instead.

Look for a boat with a beam (width) that suits your hips. You aer shorter and lighter than me, so I suspect you are narrower in the hips than me, too. For any given length, a narrower boat will go faster and paddle easier than a wide boat. My shoulders are probably also wider than yours, so I would have less difficulty paddling a wide boat, while you would be straining to get the paddle past the sides of the boat on each stroke -- or you would need a longer, heavier, paddle.

Get the narrowest width you can fit into and then get the proper length to give you sufficient displacement for your weight and the weight of your gear. With stitch and glue designs you have to look in a lot of catalogs at the specs, or check them online. With strippers you could modify an existing design rather easily. (stretch or compress the distance between frames to change length, delete or add frames to the middle to modify the beam, etc.)

Fabric covered boats are probably as fast to build as stitch and glue kits, and much cheaper. George Putz's book on building canvas covered boats has plans for a 17 foot boat ( which you could easily modify to shorten or narrow -- and I would suggest narrowing). Putz estimated that one of these boats could be built for under $200 when he wrote the book. With careful shopping that is still possible,(I think I could skrimp a bit and get it down to $160 even today) but I think most people would pay about $250 for all the materials needed. Think of that range, and compare it with the costs of a kit.

Putz's design calls for 7 full-length strips of wood, each of them about 3-4 times the thickness of a strip used for building a stripper. These can be easily cut on a table saw, or you can have a commercial lumberyard rip them for you for a small fee. (at a dollar a cut that would be $7 plus the cost of the original stock. If you use lumber that is shorter than full-length -- a likely case -- then you'll pay $14 for their service fee, and be a day ahead in your building.)

These strips are held in building forms cut from plywood panels. You'll need two sheets of common plywood and a jigsaw or sabre saw to cut them out. Once they are in place you fit in pieces for ribs and reinforcement. You can cut these parts with a hand held coping saw, or use that sabre saw. Teh reinforcements and ribs and floorbraces, and all the other little parts, are held in with a few drops of epoxy cement and some bronze screws.

You spend a few more hours building the frame for this type of skin-on-frame construction, than it takes to assemble the hull and deck with a stitch and glue kit, but once the frame is done it takes only an hour or two to cover it with fabric. There is not a lot of sanding to speak of. Overall the time to build this is about the same as a stitch and glue. If you have even the slightest interest in this type of building I strongly recommend Putz's book.

Skin (fabric) covered boats, by the way, are reputed to be very durable, as they flex when they hit an obstruction. Baidarkas, another skin covered boat with a different frame design than Putz describes, are commonly covered with nylon fabric as strong as the stuff they use to make automotive seatbelts. This is tough stuff. George Dyson has a book on Baidarkas, and sells these hightech materials for the skins. I've been thinking of building a Putz design frame with a high-tech (synthetic fiber, not canvas) skin. Last time I checked the costs, the difference would be about $50 more with the newer skin materials.

Again, the second boat is fster and cheaper because you would already have the frames. If you can find someone who has built one of these boats, go visit them, buy them a few beers and try their boat. It you like it, borrow or rent the frames from them. If you don't like it, look for some other design -- you are only out some car fare and a 6 pak -- and you have probably met a new friend.

Take your time finding the design you like, or you'll kick yourself for building something that you don't like. When you have two or three specific designs in mind post a note here and listen to any advice from people who have built those particular models. You may find people nearby, and again, make a trip to try their boat.

Best of luck with your building project. Keep us informed as to how it goes.

Paul G. Jacobson