There are many factors that determine the performance characteristics of at kayak. Hard chine verses multi chine are only one set of criteria.

If ease of building is your main criteria then hard chine is probably your best choice. They generally have few parts, and are thus faster to build. Also there are probably more free or low cost designs for hard chine.

However if your criteria extends beyond easy to build, then you will have to look at other issues. First what do you want to use the boats for? For example, are you going to mount an expedition? Then you should put a premium on higher volume boats. This in turn might cause you to favor longer, multi chine designs. These should be easier to paddle for long distances than comparable volume hard chine designs.

This is only one possible scenario, there are may others. Look around the web. There is lots of good information. Pygmy boats may not be your first choice for a product. They mainly sell kits. However they have an excellent discussion on the merits of there hard chine and multi chine boats.

Let me know what you come up with I would like to explore this with my son’s Scout troop.

Good Luck.
Don

: I'm about to make some stitch and glue kayaks with some older scouts. I've
: found two different plans that are similar, but one is hard chined (is
: this the right term for an "angled" underside?) and the other
: has a round bottom. What are the advantages and disadvantages of each? is
: one better suited to open water and one to rivers? What is the best
: overall design for multiple use (i.e. river trips or an occasional day at
: the lake)?