: origonaly I laminated an 1/4 inch strip of walnut onto the leading edge of my
: bow. my hull is made of WRC. I then layed 3 layers of 6oz glass onto the
: hull. 1 layer for the whole hull, 2 layers from the chines down and 3
: layers on high use areas(rub strips).

: now for my stupidity. at anacapa you must land and launch form a small peir.
: This peir is about 20 feet or more above mean tide. you use a pully and
: sling (you must supply your own sling) to land your kayak. The last time I
: was out at Anacapa was in plastic kayaks. We lowerd the rear of our
: unloaded kayaks by hand and lowerd the frount using a 8 foot lanyard. The
: kayaks did bounced around abit and hit the pilings a couple of times.

: Well this time I lowerd the stern most of the way to the sea. then I gave the
: bow a hard shove.

: The bow cleared the wooden railing only to hit the wooden pieling 3 1/2 to 4
: feet down.

: ok wallnut edging up to 3 layers of glass, an empty kayak (52lb) and less
: than 4 feet to fall. There can't be much damage.

: 5 1/2 inch long, 1/2 inch deep with the widest flat area 3/4 inch wide. this
: is thrugh the 1/4 inch wallnut edging. my only thought on how the dammage
: could have been this bad is if I sanded through most or all the glass on
: the leading edge.

You did have a compression failure, but glass on the leading edge wouldn't prevent this. Glass is strong in tension. For glass to do you the most good, it must be on the tension face--the inside.

To prevent this sort of damage, I laid a mat of 15 oz. biaxial glass inside the bow and stern of my latest two kayaks....it may never come into play, but it is exactly this sort of blow it is there to prevent.

: I would hate to see what would have happend if I had hit a rock during a surf
: landing.

: this time there will be about 2 inches of wallnut, and 3 to 4 layers of
: glass.
: I will be very carfull about over sanding.

What the large thickness of walnut will do for you is spread the force of the blow out over a larger area, where it will mostly be absorbed. If you can figure out a way to get some additional glass inside that, it should be nearly bulletproof.

Good luck!

Shawn