: Shawn,
: Thanks for the good advice. You have a point, I do want to be able to roll
: this boat. I have seen a lot about the recessed coaming since I have been
: coming here although having no pratical experience I could not comment on
: it. I checked out your Cormorant coaming. Nice work. Those little angled
: pieces are just glued to the thickness of the strips?

Yes, just edge-glued with Titebond II.

: And then the flat
: strips are glued to them?

Yep, the face of the flat strips is glued to the thickness of the bevel strip.

: Wow, even with the work I've been doing I am
: amazed that this would be strong enough.

With glass, it's very strong.

: If I wanted to pursue the recess
: would I need to vary my initial pieces so that I would end up with a flat
: recessed deck area in which to install the coaming?

No, your coaming will both physically and visually fit your boat better if you don't try to control the bottom elevation of the bevels. Cut them all the same length, and then let the flat recess follow them. It will be flat athwartships, but will follow the longitudinal profile of your deck.

: Your kayak has some
: curvature and it looks like all your initial pieces were identical but
: your recess is flat (I guess it angles up in the front even though the
: flat area is flat unto itself)

The kayak has a big slope from front to back of cockpit here, but that's just the way my boat worked out. You may end up with more of a concave curve in your coaming, but that will be beautiful. I guess I'm saying don't try to control the longitudinal shape of your coaming--if your boat has a concave cutout, let the coaming follow that and it will be beautiful. If you have a concave cutout, and try to make a flat coaming fit it, it will look strained (but still be strong).

: I just went to the two Mick Allen links provided on your site. It appears
: that he sketched two designs, one with the initial pieces sloping and one
: with them being perpendicular to the deck. You used the sloping method. I
: am thinking with my extreme deck curvature that the perpendicular method
: may be better for me.

With extreme deck curvature, your side strips could actually go horizontal, but this will be difficult to "eye" when building. This is how my Guillemot worked out, but I had the benefit of my original coaming to guide the location of the inboard ends of my strips.

nce I do a recess it appears that I could use my
: current coaming halves. Maybe I need to upload some pics for further
: analysis.

Yes, and Yes, please do!

: I am assuming that the recess greatly helps in rolling?

Absolutely. Having a coaming that hits you in the middle of your back makes it hard to do easy layback rolls.

: I would hate to
: decide against this option only to find later that I will need to do a
: renovation project such as you are doing.

It's not so bad either. I'm doing it partly for myself, and partly for others who are considering it--it's a fairly painless process. You built it, you can fix it, you can alter it. It's no easier or harder than the initial construction.

:I guess I'm not as impatient as
: I thought because I would rather do this right now than to work on it
: again later.

It will be a little easier now, but for those who already have coamings on, it's worth it to change if you'd like.

Shawn