Hi John,

It totally depends on the species of wood, the amount and type of glass, and type of epoxy in the wooden kayak. It also depends on the amount and type of glass, and type of resin, and layup (hand vs. vacuum-bagged) in the glass kayak.

In general (beware grand, sweeping generality here), wooden kayaks are both tougher and stiffer than fiberglass kayaks. Wood is both stiff and resilient--a wooden kayak will survive a blow that would crack and crush fiberglass, leaving little more than a whitish spiderweb in the glass over the wood. (Note that it should still be repaired in a big impact so that water cannot get into the wood and later rot it.

Also, wood is a structural core material--it can be stiffer for a lighter layup than solid glass. A stiffer hull can be a stronger hull--especially in continuous loading (as opposed to point-type damage loading as I explained before--a rock, a pier, etc.). If a big wave breaks on your deck, spreading the force all over the deck, not flexing too much will enable the wooden kayak to better weather the blow.

Kevlar kayaks are generally a little tougher, but much more flexible than wooden kayaks. The kevlar will sustain big blows but usually be enough flexing that will lose some big chunks of gelcoat.

Shawn

: How does the strength of a strip-built (or stitch & glue) kayak compare
: to commercially available fiberglass kayaks?

: The strength testing information on the Guillemot website (
: http://www.guillemot-kayaks.com/Building/Testing/index.html ) and the
: construction information on Vaclav's site are very informative, and I am
: curious to learn how the impact resistance compares to the fiberglass
: kayaks of, say, Perception, QCC, etc. Are there any test results or web
: resources relating to this?

: Thanks,

: John