: Has anyone thought of, heard of or tried building a S&G by using hull panels
: using a ployester resin/fibreglass without the plywood.

: I would imagine laying down the hull panels on a large table in roughly the
: correct shape. They would then be trimmed to the final shape before
: stitching and glueing together in the conventional way.

: The hull panels could afford to be a little thicker than normal plywood while
: still keeping the weight to a reasonable figure.

: Does this sound like a wild idea for building a really cheap and light kayak
: ?

: I look foward to your responses.

I am not a design engineer, and I like tinkering with alternatives, but I think you miss the point of using plywood, which is to make the craft lighter and gain the advantage of better fatigue resistance and also you get to enjoy the timeless beauty of the wood. I believe kayak plywood is lighter than an equivalent panel of fiberglas.

To preform fiberglas panels, then stitch and tape them together might just be a cruder, less effective way of making a fiberglas boat than using a mold. With the mold you can lay the whole thing up in one shot and then let it cure, so it would be stronger, but heavier than a wood boat.

Also, bending fiberglas panels somehow seems like a bad thing, after they cure. The advantage of fiberglas is you can mold in any shape while wet.

Also, polyester is never as good as epoxy, except for the lower toxicity of hte fumes and the cost - its heavier, weaker and shrinks while curing.

Maybe try exploring how to use wood and dispense with the weight of epoxy/fiberglass but somehow otherwise obtain the extra strength and protection of fiberglas skin, if you succeed you could revolutionize this niche.