Chesapeake Light Craft Kit

I have been thinking about building a kayak for some time.  Deciding on what type of kayak to build was easy for me.  I have been paddling West Greenland style kayak for three years now.  I have found that a hard chine kayak is the most suitable kayak to my mind and body.  The West Greenland kayak is rich in history, simple but elegant in design, very capable in rough water, and just plain fun to paddle.  I have been paddling a fiberglass Betsie Bay Recluse for two years now and was looking to build a kayak as superb as this one.

Chesapeake Light Craft (CLC) introduced the North Bay in early 1998, just the kind of craft I has been looking to build.  Since this would be the first kayak I'd build, I opted for the kit instead of building from the plans.  The North Bay is one inch narrower at the beam and six inches shorter than the Recluse.   The North Bay would also weigh a lot less than the 60lb fiberglass Recluse.  On the Recluse I had installed VCP hatch covers and a day hatch witch added to the original weight.  I would install VCP hatches on the North Bay also.  If I wanted to retain the eight inch height of the coaming aft like it is on the Recluse, I would have to modify the North Bay, as its height at coaming aft was nine inches.  The eight inch height is what I need in order to get a good layback on the rear deck.  I decided I would modify the North Bay, but only after I had already glued the sheer clamps to the side panels.  I trimmed one inch off of the side panels from bow to stern where the side panel meets the hull bottom.  This move on my part would require me to remake some of the deckbeams, and bulkheads.  I figured it was what I wanted, and it would be a great learning experience.  The modifications along with my desire to recess the front VCP hatch added a lot of hours to the construction time, and it was well worth it.

During construction I got a lot of help from the people at CLC, and from their website at http://www.clcboats.com/.  I also found a lot of help on Nick Schade's kayak building bulletin board at http://www.guillemot-kayaks.com/cgi-bin/KBbbs.cgi

It was a rewarding experience, and I think I caught the kayak building bug.  I'm already thinking about building another one.  All tolled, it took me 335 hours from July 4, 1998 to September 30, 1998 when I launched my finished kayak.  I spent around $700 on some good tools and equipment in anticipation that I would use them again and again on future kayaks.  The material costs were around $1200, but now I have a lot of epoxy, paint, varnish and sand paper that I didn't use.