> I am interested in building a double but would like to carry my wife and
> my four year old son. would the tred avon triple be my only option. He
> will ride with us until he is old enough for his own. Any suggestions
> about these models or others are appreciated.

I doubt you will want to try rough water or rolling with the 4 year old aboard, so why limit yourself to a design with small cockpits? Any double can be configured to have a large, open cockpit that will easily carry the three of you, and give the little one a chance to stand up and stretch ( doesnt change the center of gravity very much if the kid does this. Now if YOU try it . . .)

You can make two decks, or just the centers (cockpit coaming areas) for tow decks. When the kid gets bigger, or the family adds another (?) you can turn this back into a true double, or a long single, and adjust the seating to balance with two adults, or with an adult and a child.

Since you are doing the building, you really have a lot of options here.

If you are thinking of doing several tops, to accomodate different seating configurations, you dont have to finish all of them at once, but you might want to start them all at the same time. If you stack 3 sheets of plywood and cut them identically for decks, you can later cut out any cockpit configurations you want, and they will drop into place when needed.

Hope these ideas help.

Paul Jacobson