I wonder if there is really much benefit to these ultralight boats. What you save in weight may be sacrificed in other areas.

Once you pack a sandwich and a bottle of water you are over weight anyway. This is before all the clothing, spray deck, safety gear, PDF, spare paddle, spare tyre, etc, etc.

Unless one is bare boat racing the only real benefit I can see to saving the extra couple of kilos is getting it on the car. Once the boat is in the water there is really no disernable difference and the thin skins, bulkheads, paint jobs, and reduced deck outfitting may compromise convenience and toughness.

Sure, for the fun of seing if you can do it, why not? But I wouldn't be too obsessive about it.

If you really have to have the light weight you are probably better off going for something like a Dyson SOF using aircraft aluminium frames and carbon tube stringers with a lightweight skin.

I can see where a small slight person may benefit from lighter weight, but then they would probably be in a smaller (hence lighter) boat anyway.

Et