I'm looking at building my first kayak and I'm glad to find this site. Any advice you've got, I'm happy to take.

Two questions:
I had just about settled on a Pygmy kit (the Osprey Standard; I'm drawn to the kits because I have no confidence in my ability to build straight from plans the first time out) when I had a conversation last night with a friend who built two kayaks from Glen-L plans. His Glen-Ls are 17 feet, and his first comment to me was that the shorter boat would be better for the kind of use he's gotten and I'm anticipating (Northern California/SF Bay and surrounding day trips; I'd describe myself as comfortable in a boat, advanced beginner wise). That I didn't need as much boat as he had and as I might be building. The Osprey's 15'8"...and now I'm wondering again about the Arctic Tern, which is even shorter at 14. So this is a length question and a hard v. multi chine question: does anyone have any specific insight in the tradeoffs between these?

Second question: why use copper wire or zip ties? Copper's provided in the kit, and seems like it's fine to work with...but I've been zip ties touted far and wide on the web. Any odd pitfalls in copper?

Thanks.