Hi everybody,

A while ago I posted a message asking if you-all routinely do vacuum bagging. I received gracious responses asking what I meant and what was my project. I want to build a super foxy cedar or redwood strip kayak using very thin strips. When the project is sanded to perfection, and prior to installing the skirt rim, I could install the glass fabric on the top half using vacuum bagging to compress the layup, then bag the lower half, overlapping three inches at the sides. Does that make sense to you guys?

In general, have home builders generally moved to vacuum bagging shapes that bagging will work on? Or is it still a bit complicated for most hobby builders? What it means to me is that if the answer is yes, or at least some, then there might be a much better retail supply chain of glassing supplies than when I used to work fiberglass back in the stone age.

IMO one shape that I think won't take bagging is a shiplap rowing skiff. The bag material could not be able to smoothly cover the longitudinal shiplap indents. Is there a new sheet material that 'will' work in this situation, by stretching and following the contours of all those laps? I'm thinking of assembling the skiff, then disassembling it and glassing each piece, then reassembling it.

Roger