New update on fiberglass and laquer compatibility. I took a break from the build at the point where I had the deck clear-coated, masked and the hull primed. I temporarily stored the kayak outside in the shade. When I brought it back into the shop and removed the masking I had on the deck, two large areas of the rear deck fiberglass had delaminated. I have removed it and am in the middle of making repairs.

My best guess is that the laquer in those areas was not fully cured when I fiberglassed and the VOCs lifted the glass.

In addition to that, the fiberglass is lifting off of some of the vinyl stars. I have not yet decided what to do about that but if I ever duplicate the design, I will have to come up with another method for producing the stars.

In this current build, I have departed from the usual strip building I have done in the past. The hull is stitch and glue. My biggest difficulty in starting out was finding a local source for the 4mm marine plywood called for in the plans. I eventually settled for 3mm and am compensating by using 6oz glass instead of the 4oz in the plans. I also laminated a 1" wide strip to the shear line to create a better land for the deck strips.
The major plus for the stitch and glue is that from plans to a fiberglassed hull took 8 - 10 hours.
I am doing a lot of experimenting on this project as you can see from the staining post. I intend to paint the hull instead of going with a clear coat. Since (unfortunately) my kayaks spend less time in the water than out, I am planning to use automotive paint on the hull. I am finding that this gives me a much wider choice of colors than sticking with marine paints. For the final coat on both hull and deck, I intend to use Epifanes clear varnish. Since my wife and kids bought me an Earlex HVLP sprayer for Father's Day last year, this will also be my first foray into sprayed finish coats.
My current plan is to have this kayak ready to go in the water by May 5 when my soldier daughter gets home on leave. The plan is to spend a day on Lake Tahoe

This is my current build. At this point it is almost ready for fiberglass on the deck. This is a hybrid Night Heron with the high deck option. My size 12 1/2 feet limit the designs I can comfortably fit into.
The deck is a combination of redwood and poplar. I stained the redwood with a water based stain to accent the color. The foredeck is poplar with a blue Minwax wiping stain. The stars are white vinyl made from sticky-back vinyl sheet and a star punch.
The staining of the stripes was a somewhat involved process. When I first tested the stain, the color spread from strip to strip. I did some research and found that epoxy bonds very well with laquer so I eventually masked the area to be stained and sprayed laquer on the unmasked area. After stripping the masking, I stained the red and cleaned up the minimal over-stain. I then put two coats of laquer on to allow light sanding without removing the stain.
We are having a rather cool spring here, so I am waiting for temperatures in the seventies to lay the glass on the deck.
I have decided to go with a stacked plywood coaming lip instead of the standing strip and laminated ash lip I have used on my other kayaks. I am hoping to speed up the process a little and to strengthen the cockpit area since with the smaller "keyhole" cockpit cut out on this design, I will have to sit on the deck to enter the boat.

This was my first kayak build - a Guillemot Great Auk. For my first build, I selected a large, stable kayak for several reasons. First was the need to refresh old skills before moving to a more aggressive, higher performance design. Second was the desire to have a multi-function kayak for cruising, camping and fishing. Third, I wanted a kayak that would be stable and easy to paddle for beginning paddlers. Fourth, I wanted a kayak on which I could learn the new skills I needed for kayak construction - bending and shaping wood and fiberglassing. Fifth, since I have size 12 feet and long legs, I wanted a large, comfortable kayak.
I purchased Nick Schade's book " The Strip-Built Sea Kayak" and since I have access to AutoCad and large format printers, I lofted the plans offsets provided in the book. I then cut and routed the cove and bead on the strips. A note here - if you have access to wood working equipment (table saw, jigsaw, router as a minimum), this is a great way to go and very satisfying. If you lack the equipment, I would recommend purchasing a kit from one of the kit suppliers.

At this point, I would like to make several comments on things I learned the hard way. Planning ahead saves a lot of time on the build procedures. At the start, I didn't realize how much time would be involved simply waiting for glue and epoxy to dry and cure. Take the time to assemble your full length strips several days before you need them. Let glue dry completely so that you don't end up regluing and repairing your work. That said, few mistakes result in complete disaster because the strip-building process is quite forgiving.

After gluing (spray adhesive) the patterns to particle board, I rough cut them with a jigsaw and fine cut them on a bandsaw. The bandsaw does not tend to lift the edges of the paper patterns from the wood as the jigsaw does. The bow and stern forms were cut from 1x12 pine to allow shaping of the edges to the correct profile. Rough shaping was accomplished with a block plane, rasps and coarse sandpaper.

I built a strongback from 1/2" plywood per Nick's book. I have since purchased a 4"x2" aluminum tube for the convenience of
re-usability.

I marked the strongback with the form positions and fit each one. I aligned the forms on the strongback with a square and a string line to line up the keel and shear lines. As I got each one set, I locked it in place with hot glue and wood blocks. Following this, I wrapped the edges of each form with duct tape to keep the glue between strips from gluing the strips to the forms. Make sure the tape you use does not stick to the glue you use. An alternate would be to wrap the entire form with plastic sheeting.

With everything locked in place, I was ready to place the first strip. Since I was working with 8' and 10' strips I created several full length strips by scarfing the ends and gluing two strips together. I removed the bead and contoured the edge of the strip with the plane to provide a flat landing for the first deck strip. Placing this strip is one of the most difficult because there is no support for it and the alignment is very important to the rest of the build. I locked it in place with a combination of staples and small finishing nails (leave the heads up so you can pull them later). Again, following the directions from the book, I placed the strips with the cove side up. This makes it much easier to apply the glue for succeeding strips and with the pattern I followed, made it easier to shape those strips as well. Install strips on alternate sides to avoid errors in the pattern and to keep from building unwanted stress into the hull.

The bow and stern present the biggest challenges while stripping. The changes in direction, twist and bow of the strips can make it difficult to keep the joints tight. If you have access to a steam box, it can be a big help. If you don't have a steam box, careful application of heat from a heat gun can make the pieces more flexible. Nick addresses various methods for managing the bow shape in his book.

To keep the keel as straight as possible, I purchased 1/4" dowels and scarfed several together to create a single keel piece. I then installed the round keel piece to the forms with finish nails (again, leave the heads up so you can pull them later) and a stringline to insure straightness. I then installed full length strips with cove side to the round.