: Mike, I like his idea of scoring skins and coatings, and your
: questions about the various aspects of how such a score could be
: cahllenged are right on.

: But you can both be "right" and the founders of a very
: useful "Rating About Skin Hazards" listing. A Skin
: RASH list. (yeah, it IS close to April Fools day, but we are not
: there yet :) )

: I propose the RASH rating be made up of several factors, with each
: factor ranked from 0 to 10. or 0 to 20. Total score 100, but
: major elements such as durability, strength, and price would go
: on the 0 to 20 scale,(60 points here) while minor items such as
: availability, ease of use, cost, and "wow" factor
: would have 0-10 ranges (40 points here) so they don't overwhelm
: the really important stuff. For example, a piece of clear vinyl
: might get a high score of 10 in the "Wow" factor, but
: only an 8 out of 20 in durability for 12 mil material, and a
: lower score for thinner stuff.

: Add up all the 7 scores to get a ranking from 0 to 100.

: I'm sure there will be lots of people who think that we should
: grade in more than 7 areas, and amny who think my example areas
: don;t cover the bases. Great. if we can come up with a list of
: the areas to be judged we can give each area however many points
: we feel it is worth. I'd still like to keep the total @ 100, but
: there is no reason why something like "wow" can't be
: on a 0 to 3 scale, and then have 97 more possible points to
: award in all the other areas.

: What areas do we grade? I've already listed my Initial 7 above.
: Anyone have other suggestions.

: PGJ
I like this idea, but judging from the initial response to my orginal post I am afraid that there may not be enough information out there to fill out this kind of matrix.
I am starting to get the idea that unless you are really abusing your kayak (something most people don't do) you don't really ever see how much better one skin is over another.
That is as far as toughness and durability go anyway. I suppose you could pretty easily put together something about ease of application, "wow factor", wrinkles, etc.