Red Fish Kayak in Port Thousand designed this "Spring Run" for very good speed and primary stability. 16 feet long, less than 40 pounds and a lot of storage both fore and aft. It's a good fit in the relatively calm waters of Puget Sound and a very fast lake boat.

For this boat, there are 16 forms that are aligned preciously of a backbone. Here, the hull and deck is made with a combination of Alaskan yellow cedar and western red cedar. You can used any wood but cedar is light and strong however cedar is much too soft to take much abuse. So I started the deck by attaching a piece of hard wood (walnut in my case) to the bow, stern and around the edge of of the hull, a kind of protective "bumper" around the outside of the kayak to minimize damage.

Each 18' long cedar strips is tongue and grooved, 3/4' wide and 1/8" thick. A strip this thin needs no stream to bend and will snuggly wrap around the form. Starting on the waterline of the hull, you lay down a strip of wood onto the form, attach it to the form with a staple (you know, from a staple gun) and its on the the next strip. Into the tongue and groove on the next strip goes a little wood glue, attach it to the previous strip and add strips until the hull is done.

Then, you remove the hull from the form and do the same for the top deck of the kayak. The strip run wild over the cockpit and ends. Once the deck and cockpit hatch are finished, the form is removed and the two halves are joined with epoxy.

Next is fiberglass, a messy business requiring a pair of latex gloves. I used "organic" epoxy as opposed to polyester. The setup time is longer (time you will need to do a neat job) and has a much more benign odor. You need only a well ventilated space, not a mask. Fiber glassing the inside of the kayak first, joining the halves of the boat and then glassing the outside - takes a lot of time. The set time is 6 hours and curing requires days before you can do any sanding.

Cut out the hatches and add a cowling to the cockpit so water can't splash into the boat. It's also nice to add an 1/8th inch thick veneer strips around the cowling to provide a lip onto which a "splash skirt" can be attached. A splash skirt is something worn by kayakers, a special shirt with a simple draw string added to the bottom. You can protect the inside of the kayak from getting wet by slipping this shirt over the lip of the cowling and pull tight the draw string.

Finally comes the sanding and varnishing - about a week of finishing all the surfaces. This leaves only the installation of rigging, foot pegs, knee braces and seat - it's a boat.