Sorry for the delay in posting, just saw the post. I've designed and built four strippers

My first strip kayak I designed and built at 17.5 feet and 20 inches (looks like a Guillemot front with a Looksha rear) and 50 pounds. I overglassed inside and outside. Hell, I didn't know what I was doing.
My second was 19 feet and 19 inches and was 49 pounds.
My third was 18/20 and 46 pounds.
My last was 18 feet 19 inches and 43 pounds with the foot pump, too.
I wanted to use carbon fiber for it's high strength and low weight and ease of workability. The trouble was it is beyond merely expensive but I was given a roll remnant which changed the picture. Foir the last yak, Rikki's
It was made of Honduran mahogany with sugar pine pin stripes followed by a sweeping and intertwining "ribbons" of purpleheart and holly. All heavy woods. The bow and stern have replaceable rub strips (black PETE plastic front) white UHMW plastic rear). There's a Bosworth Guzzler 450S foot pump on the forward bulkhead, the cockpit is with a molded minicell seat and backrest and hip pads that extend forward to reduce cockpit volume. No rudder. With that I got the weight down by using 3.4 ox triaxial s-glass (the satin stuff) in two layers on the deck topsides, the hull outside is 6 ox s-glass with the football of 6 oz s-glass. The inside deck and hull are 5.4 ox carbon fiber 2 by 2 weave cloth. The cockpit hull and deck underside has a second layer of CF as does around the hatches. Also, there a longitudinal series of "stringers" and concentric "ribs" made up of CF strips 4 inches wide. The stringers are placed under the centerline of the deck, attach the deck and hull together, and are at either side of the keel between chine and keel. That's 5 stringers. The ribs are 4 inch CF strips that go around the inside of the deck and hull to the stern of the rear hatch ( a large hatch) and forward of the front hatch (a large hatch). There's a bow and stern end-pout of CF chopped fiber mixed with dyed epoxy and fumed silica. All deck fitting that I ever use are attached to the deck via s/s t-nuts (10-24). To save weight, I didn't fill the inside coats, sanded smooth everything inside to look pretty and professional, and used 3 mm baltic birch for the bulkheads with CF on both sides and a large fillet of CF yarns under a CF tape. All that came out to 43 pounds. Still heavish but strong as a tank. The CF really saved on the weight, the Bosworth pump really added to the weight but was planned into the kayak at the very beginning ( all four have them installed). The rub strips add to the weight and I'm thinking to go to the "foamed" plastics. I'm consulting with the folks at Ridout Plastics here in San Diego (who had their building toasted by the recent brush fire).
Another thing I found is that a balanced yak really feels lighter then a unbalanced yak at the same weight when carried.
So in recap, I was fortunate to have a large roll of CF to play with. Incresing weight savings with same stregth requirements means dramatic cost increses. Conversely, to save weight and money means decresiong strength. Then again, there will be precious few times when the kayak will be stressed by conditions that will break it...any wise and perceptive individual will avoid such situations on the water. Most often it seems that landing and launches and transport accidents make up the majority of breaks and hard hits. So with that, the idea for us was to have a strong layup INSIDE the kayak, a oyster shell will slice through however many layers of whatever you have so what's the point of all those layers on the underside of the hull? Those hits are rare, but rubs and scrapes of the keel are guranteed unless you do what Rikki does and gets out in shallow water (unlike I who always plows into the beach). This gets me to the point where the more you paddle the more the yak gets craped and dinged. I'm at the point with my yak that I periodically sand the bottom and rub on a 1 oz layer of epoxy and call it done. It's a kayak and not a piece of jewlery and that feeling tends to color my thoughts.
How's that for a meaningless morning babble session? How's the NH coming? I have some thoughts about the tracking issues that many complain about (also known as a nice and maneueravble yak). Try installing a removeable keel strip.