Skin on frame kayaks

[Tortoise]

These are really neat and I was wondering if anyone had ever made one of these the traditional way, they were made by the inuits of Greenland and such.

[Jimbob]

There was a post on here about one of these a while back, cant remember who posted it though.

[mullet]

David Tiller has made a couple of them and was the last post by Alpinbogen?

[zdogk9]

I've made forty or so, quite easy to make if you don't start chasing your tail

[Alpinbogen]

Forty?!  Yowza, that's alot of builds!  I've built two and have a serious appreciation for the amount of work that must have gone into forty kayaks. 

Tortoise, Some great things about these types of kayaks include that you custom built them to fit/suit exactly what you need, that they are very light, rugged, faster, and cheaper to build than most other kayaks, and of course you get to paddle your own creation.

[mullet]

And,, you forgot, they look great! That, is nice.

[Tortoise]

  That's really neat! After I finish up my bow in the works I'll look into making one of these. What is the skin from?

[bowtarist]

cool boat!!  man I bet that's fun to paddle!!  dpgratz

[Lee Slikkers]

Any books or plans either of you experienced makers can highly recommend for making one of these???  Many thanks~

[Alpinbogen]

Tortoise/Lee, I used ballistic nylon fabric.  12oz weight on the first one and 8 oz on the latest.  I sealed both with a thick 2-part urethane resin that is squeegied over the skin.  I followed Cunningham's, "Building the Greenland Kayak" book for the most part, but used a more conventional stitching method, which I feel draws the skin tighter.  The skin on both sounds like a drum.  Zero problems with loose skin.  Skinboats.org sells the covering materials and has great tutorials (skinning especially).   Partial skinning job and flotation bag placement shown here.

[Lee Slikkers]

Ah man, ok...now ya got me hooked   I recall seeing your posts and build before (and probably asked you the same question then) but that was many PC's ago so thanks for the info.  I will check out that website and likely order the book tomorrow.  I think this could be a real good project for me & my boys...they could learn so much from building something like these.  Thanks again~

[barefootbowhunter]

a good friend of mine makes skin boats, they are fishin mashines! he makes the west coast style bidarka or somthin like that. much more stable lots more room and really stealthy, we plan on bowhunting ducks with them next season, should be a lot of fun. me and him keep talkin about ways to hunt seals with them and how cool a seal skin kayak would be, or mayby a walrus skin boat those are really cool not a kayak but still really cool

[zdogk9]

"Building Skin on Frame Boats" Robert Morris
"Skin Boats of Greenland" H. C. Peterson
"The Greenland Kayak" Harvey Golden
"Baidarka" George Dyson
"The Aleutian Kayak" Wolfgang Brink
All of these are good, building the qajaq is more of a process than anything else. If you feel that you'd benefit from taking a class I'd recommend Brian at Cape Falcon Kayaks, he's a good teacher his fees are reasonable

[venisonburger]

I did a skin on frame covered with canvas and sealed with a UV activated body filler, but oil based paint works too,I'm told  the life span of the canvas is only about 5 years, I sold my boat before it got to that age so I don't know if that's accurate or not. My plans came from a book by George Putz, very informative book. I'm thinking of doing a nylon covered canoe, I find it hard to get in and out of a kayak these days.