Careful, though. I asked for door skins at a local Cleveland lumberyard, having had no luck finding 1/8" luan at the various home depot type places, or other lumberyards. They said they didn't stock it, but could order it. What I ended up with was a 4'x8' sheet, with a layer of thin wood veneer, layed on top of some kind of pressboard. If you were building or repairing a REALLY cheap, weak door, it would be ok, as the non-veneered side of the pressboard would never be visible. It was useless to me for the paddle blades I was fashioning, and would be even more useless for making a kayak. And I had to pay a restock fee when returning this (it was "special order" after all), even though it wasn't what I asked for (I shouldn't have to define "plywood" to a lumberyard employee, should I?).

Chris

> Try asking for "door skins" explicitly at the the home
> improvement stores. That will probably get the clerks steering you towards
> the 1/8" luan. I built using the 1/4" luan, and have no
> complaints. Bending it for the hull was no problem, though trying to arch
> it over as the deck was a hard battle that I gave up on. For a deck I'd be
> much more inclined to go with 1/8"

> Shop it around. Luan is not all the same. Not by a long shot. The stuff at
> the Home Depots around here is very good, with nearly uniform layers of
> inner fill and outer skins. The stuff at Lowes has tissue paper thin outer
> skins. Various lumber yards have various grades and qualities as well.

> Epoxy isn't on every store shelf, as you've discovered. So it often
> involves shipping. People have been saying good things about Raka recently
> on this board. It's far cheaper, and might be worth trying if you really
> want to switch.