: i just finished building my first kayak, plywood construction. and
: i was planning on fiber glassing the hull but i painted it
: first. i learned later this was wrong . so i decided to just go
: ahead put a coat of resin over it. two weeks later its still
: tacky will it ever dry or is it doomed. im sure the best way to
: fix it would be to strip it down to bare wood and then glass it.
: but the paint job is so beautiful. it looks like an old pirate
: ship. ive learned alot about what not to do since i started this
: project and if anyone could give me some advice about fixing my
: mistakes i would really appreciate it.

I'm just guessing but it sounds like there are three issues here:
1) The paint under the epoxy - probably not what is preventing the epoxy from curing, but will prevent the epoxy from really gripping the wood well (the epoxy will peel the pain off the wood, for future reference.)
2) The epoxy itself - sounds like the epoxy mix was off, so it is not curing correctly. The proportions of the two parts is important - most are 2 to 1 epoxy to hardener, and if you get that balance off, it won't cure.
3) The missing fiberglass (fabric)... As I understand, the boat needs the fiberglass for strength. This is applied on both the inside and outside of the shell, and holds the panels together, as well as providing strength and stiffness.

I think you are going to need to strip it back down to bare wood, and then fiberglass and epoxy the boat. There are paints that can be applied over epoxy/fiberglass, so you don't have to worry to much about the paint job. Take a few pictures, and use them as reference for the re-paint after the fiberglass is on correctly.

Good luck, and I'm sure some of the more experienced folks will pipe up soon.

Stephen HJ