Skin On Frame Kayak Building

Custom kayaks rowboats and sailboats offered as plans kits and classes.

Skin on frame kayak building.

These gaps are covered with cloth as the skin. The result is a boat that is light and yet strong. Advantages of skin on frame. In skin on frame technology you build a lightweight frame by pegging and lashing together pieces of wood and then covering the frame with a skin.

Modern skin on frame kayaks typically use synthetic fabric such as nylon or dacron. Modern hulls meet traditional build. The modern skin on frame kayak is a traditional ultralight craft. This is an adaptation of one of my favorite new designs.

Half the weight but stronger than a fiberglass sea kayak. Starting from either logs or lumber. The big advantage for the traditional builders of skin on frame kayaks the aleut and inuit residents of the far north is they could be built with the materials on hand. This is actually very similar to strip building except the frames are part of the finished boat and there are big gaps between the strips.

The skin on frame building style i plan on using is called fuselage frame where long strips or stringers of wood are bent around cross sectional frames. Some builders use cotton canvas.