: Bill,
: In my post I mentioned one unplanned and many pre-planned dumps. To clarify,
: these were wet exits and involved righting the boat, re-entering and
: pumping out. I have never experienced an undue amount of water in the
: boat.

Thinking of the couple of times I swam in the surf last year and how my little whitewater boat filled up with so much water that it was a PTA. Can't imagine having to deal with a 16' kayak full of water in the surf. Oh, ya, and I had float bags in my ww kayak. I really would like to know your secret.

: I'm not advocating bulkhead free boats,
: just pointing out that bulkheads are not as essential as beginners are
: sometimes led to believe.

One good reason to not have bulkheads is that with float bags the water will equally distributes itself fore and aft making the kayak potentially more stable than one with a flooded compartment. Still, the advantages of bulkheads far outweigh the advantages of not having them.