Today I launched my Yost Kidarka with a modified "surfski" cockpit for my 7 y/o daughter. The goal was 1. to have a boat that wouldn't fill with water when capsized (cold water in N. California and a 7 y/o can't roll very well - at least not mine). 2. Investigate this technique for a future SOF surfski for me. The frame is just normal fuselage construction, but the cockpit is S&G.

Overall I'm happy with how it turned out. I somehow managed to screw up the most important measurement on the whole boat - cockpit length, so she'll outgrow it sooner than I'd like. Not such a problem though since it gives me an excuse to build another boat!

The combination of SOF and S&G worked pretty well, but it almost doubled the effort of the project. Part of it was moving around some of the cross sections - a major game of whack-a-mole (change one cross section and it affects how the stringers/gunwales fit on the adjacent ones. . .then make some adjustments there and that changes other cross sections. . . etc. I must have been doing something wrong), and part of it was all the epoxying, sanding, painting on the cockpit that you're not supposed to worry about with SOF. If I do it again, I'l probably just go for a fiberglass cockpit - it would be lighter and probably less effort.

Thanks to Tom Yost for a great design, Corey Freedman for those great Youtube sewing videos and many others in forums like this for lots and lots of great info!
Cheers
-Chris