Kite +6%

[Alan Gage]

I've been thinking about the double layer thing quite a bit lately. My first Osprey, which saw several thousand kilometres of tripping over the course of a decade was built with one single six ounce layer of regular fiberglass, inside and out. It saw some very rough usage, had some bad dumps in whitewater, and did get quite a few superficial repairs. Since then I've always put a football on, but I'm thinking that unless you are going to beat the heck out of your canoe, why bother?

I would agree with this. I nearly always put in extra layers somewhere, and it now seems to be the thing to do, but the vast majority of cedar strip canoes have been built with 1/4" strips and a single layer of 6 oz cloth and they work great.

I haven't done the math but I'd guess that 1/4" strips with a single layer is lighter weight than 3/16" strips with an extra layer to add stiffness. I've built boats where I used thicker strips on the bottom (where I wanted the stiffness) and transitioned to thinner strips on the sides.

Alan

 

[BigandSmall]

Those fasteners are double headed picture hanging nails that I've used once already. They used to be a lot cheaper on Amazon. I'm just going to use them on the tumblehome section.