Thank, John. Don't be deceived. The camera is very friendly and conceals many mistakes.

The WLII would be fine for a first strip-built project. The only significant difference between building a canoe and a kayak is that with a canoe you must spend more time on fairing the interior. And the concave interior is where fairing is most difficult. On a kayak, the interior is not too important since most of it will not be visible. On a canoe, it's just about all you see. Just something to consider, but not necessarily a deciding factor.

For fillets, I used cedar wood flour and cabosil. I would estimate about 65% cabosil, 35% wood flour gave me a color that was close. There are only a couple places where fillets are visible: around the bulkheads and at the keelline near the stems. You can tell it's not wood, but the color is pretty close.

Feel free to email me if you have detailed questions.

Ross

> Ross,

> Gorgeous work! Hope I can progress to that level of craftsmanship some
> day.

> Two questions:

> 1) Would you recommend a WLII for a first-time strip-built project? (If
> it's taken you 170 hrs. so far, god knows how long it would take me)! I'm
> not much more than a beginner woodworker.

> 2) What did you use for fillet material? (The fillets in my S&G were made
> with maple flour and they are very dark and ugly as sin! Fortunately the
> deck, etc. will hide them).

> Thanks, John