Strip Built

Well All, 

With the arrival of a beautiful custom seat from Joe Greenley at Redfish Kayak, my Kayak Couture project is done short of some final fitting adjustments on the seat when we get back to some decent weather here (20 degrees here today, even the lawn is frozen solid).  The boat replaces my wife's sassy Chesapeake 14 that is approaching 20 years old now (but still in great shape).

well today i finished the epoxy work on the boat (frej 90 15 feet long 19 inches wide)....so it is all seamed, bulkheads installed, skeg in, internal rigging points completed....so the only thing left now is finish sanding, varnish, seat, back-band and rigging.   so will be taking a couple months off during the winter until i can start work again in the spring....it should be quick work at that time.

I am building an adjustable skeg using marine ply for the blade. I applied glass cloth to each face of the plywood before cutting the skeg to shape Now I need to seal the edges. Is just epoxy enough or do I need to wrap cloth around the edges? It seems it would be difficult to conform the cloth to the shape especially in the slot for the pivot pin. 

I'm going to make a Mystic River Canoe from plans and was wondering how important it is to have 18' strips. Or, should I just attach smaller strips? I guess I can certainly mail order them if it comes to it although wonder if it is cheaper to mill my own..

I have a router table and tablet saw but it seems sort of difficult to put  a bead and cove in 18' strips.. but is this how it's done? On the other hand, if I connect a bunch of smaller strips, I imagine it will have color variations.

does anyone use the festool rotary sander for sanding strip built kayaks ?   i'm thinking about getting the 5 inch. 

Festool 571782 RO 125 FEQ Rotex Sander

hi all, 

its been  a while and i am working on a new project....a 90% frej (15 ft length and 19 inches beam) that i am trying to build up very light for my wife.

the basic approach is 3/16 red cedar with 4 oz s glass inside and out, internal seam kevlar taped,  keyhole cockpit and a target weight fully rigged of 22 lbs.

given the hull form, it looks pretty important to have a skeg and wanted to see if anybody had suggestions for good plans that are easy to build or a well constructed skeg that can be bought/installed.

I wondered if anyone has built eiter of these designs: Redfish "Silver" of Laughing Loon "Disko Bay"?

In my ongoing search for an ultra-light, lower-volume build

I am toying with making one of Rob Mack's Aleut doubles but at 21' it's too long so I need to be able to store and transport it in two halves. Has anybody come up with a good system?

I am in the process of converting an old boat trailer into a 4 place kayak trailer. The frame is 2.5" square tubing with two 2.5" square vertical posts 54" high and 80" apart with two 48" storage boxes slightly recessed on each side of center and just ahead of the axel. This has been a part time project all summer and from day one I did not know how I was going to hang the kayaks or secure them down. I have reached the point I have to make a decision and I have - - - - nothing :((