Welcome to our kayak building website. We won’t claim to have all the answers, but we have had some success and since we’ve already bored all our friends with the whole kayak construction thing, we figured it was time to branch out to a new audience.
So far, our Getting Started section can help answer a lot of questions you might have if you are just starting to think about building your own kayak. If you are thinking of building a strip kayak then our section on building the Endeavour sea kayak has a pretty good gallery that covers our build from start to finish.

Over time we’ll fill in the site with what we know about kayak building, share what we learned through the process, and even offer some untested opinions on what we’d do next time. Of course since you’re here, you are probably looking to start building a kayak now and you probably don’t want to wait for us to get around to finishing this whole website. In that case you might want to check out a few of the kayak building books that Scott and I found really useful when we built our first kayak.

I’m also getting the itch to start on that next project. The kids are getting bigger and there are times when we really need another vessel on our canoe trips. I’m looking for a kayak that would be big enough for a 4 day trip, fairly stable for fishing but not too big for just hanging around at the cottage. The Wood Duck 14′ from Chesapeake Light Craft is looking like a good option, but if you think there is a better choice, let me know.

Leigh Ross of Unicorn Kayaks gave us some feedback on our Choosing a Building Technique post and suggested that we take a look at YouTube for some videos that show just how tough the skin on a skin-on-frame kayak can be. Here is one video from Shaman Kayaks that shows that these boats can take a fair bit of routine abuse or use.

When it comes time to pick the epoxy to cover your beautiful hand built kayak with, a common question that is well worth asking is which epoxy holds up best? Now I’ve only personally used West Systems epoxy and that has consistently been with their 207 hardener. I have also consistently used Interlux Traditional Spar Varnish overtop of the epoxy.  I’ve been happy with the results over 16 years now.

However, Vaclav Stejska of One Ocean Kayak did a pretty well put together test that compared:

• West System 105 resin and 206 hardener
• West System 105 resin and 207 special coating hardener
• Raka 127 resin 350 hardener
• MAS resin and slow hardener
• System Three resin and medium hardener
• East System 1032 resin and 834 slow hardener

The test panel that Vaclav put together had a section for each of these epoxy resin & hardener combinations. Then for each epoxy, part of the section was varnished and part was left unvarnished using Z*Spar Flagship 2015 for the varnish. Finally Vaclav added a strip of opaque plastic down the middle to add light protection to a part of both the varnished and unvarnished sections for each epoxy to test the impact of light exposure, and as it turned out to inadvertently test the effect of extended exposure to moisture.  The complete test panel was then left sitting outside exposed to the sun. That gives us a total of 24 different combinations being tested with this one test panel, which makes for a pretty extensive test and Vaclav recorded and reported on the results after 2, 6, and 12 months.

Now thinking back to the last time I did a statistics course and having some vague memories about experimental design, I know you would need a lot more than just the one panel to come up with a solid, repeatable conclusion. Nonetheless, this is still the best comparison that I’ve seen for so many different epoxies in one spot. One other thing that I’ll point out is that Vaclav did his test starting in March 2000. That means it’s over 10 years old now and it is quite likely that the epoxy manufacturers have updated their products in that time. Here is the link to the Epoxy Test at One Ocean Kayaks.

Kayaks are probably the most custom tailored of any boats. In fact, if you’re building a traditional skin-on-frame kayak, then the dimensions are directly based on your size. While other kayak designs aren’t quite that customized, when it comes to kayaks size does matter. In this article, I’m going to focus on the volume of the kayak that you need rather than on the length, or width, or style of kayak, which we’ve covered in a couple of our other articles.

Now before getting into too many details of how to pick the right sized kayak for you, let’s take a minute to look at how and why a boat, any type of boat, floats. In it’s simplest form, a kayak is just a hollow shell. That hollow shell has a weight of it’s own and it also has a volume of empty space (well actually it’s air) inside the hollow shell. Of course water has weight too, so when you put the empty kayak in the water it pushes an amount of water out of the way that is equal to the weight of the kayak. The amount, or rather volume, of water that a boat “pushes out of the way” is the “displacement” of the boat.  

Illustration of how an empty kayak displaces just enough water to equal the weight of the kayak hull. As you put more weight into the kayak, either yourself or gear, then the kayak sinks lower in the water until it has displace or "pushed away" enough water to equal the weight of the kayak and all of it's contents.

Since all that empty air inside the kayak doesn’t weigh nearly as much as the water underneath the kayak, you end up with a ‘light’ kayak floating on top of the ‘heavy’ water. As you put more stuff into the kayak – whether it’s yourself, the dog, or your camping gear – the kayak gets heavier and “displaces” or pushes away more water until the amount of water that the kayak has displaced is equal in weight to the weight of the kayak and all of its contents. If you want a more detailed scientific you can look up Archimedes Principal of Bouyancy.

I introduced the concept of a “design waterline” when I talked about Kayak Hull Shapes, Length, & Width. The design waterline is where the designer intends for the kayak to sit when it has the proper load in it. That load could just be you, or it could be you and bunch of gear. The good news is that you don’t have to be exactly on the design waterline, anywhere within a reasonable range will let the kayak perform well. This is why most kayak designers provide a recommended or “optimum” load range for their kayaks. For example the Endeavour Sea Kayak has an optimum capacity of   150 – 260 lbs (68 – 118 kg). As long as you are using your kayak within the optimum load range, then it will handle the way the designer planned it to.

Illustration of how an overloaded kayak has to displace so much water that it sinks well below the design waterline.

On the other hand, if you overload the kayak, it will sit lower in the water than it was intended to. This will give the kayak a longer waterline, probably give a wider beam, and reduce the amount of rocker. All of these factors will make the kayak feel sluggish in the water – possibly to the point where you’ll feel like you are paddling a barge. OK, so now that we’ve looked at why the size or volume of the kayak matters, how do you pick a kayak that is the right size for you? This is probably one of the easier decisions you get to make when choosing which kayak to build, because it has everything to do with weight, and nothing to do with esthetics or style. Start by thinking about who is going to use the kayak and what they are most likely to be using it for. If you are building a recreational kayak for playing around at the cottage, then you just need a kayak that is big enough to carry the paddler and maybe 10-20lbs (5 – 10 kg) of fishing equipment. On the other hand if you are buiding a sea kayak for some weekend or longer trips, then you’ll need a something big enough to carry the paddler and maybe as much as 100 lbs ( 45 kg) of camping gear. The folks at  the Newfound Woodworks help to remind you to consider the weight of you gear when they give the recommended weight capacities for their kayaks. For example they say that their Explorer hybrid kayak will “work nicely for 130-175 lb paddlers on trips with gear or for 175-225 lb paddlers for day trips.” So what’s the worst thing that will happen if you build your kayak and then decide you picked a design that was the wrong size? Well, I guess the really worst thing would be that you could sink your kayak, but most likely you will just have to go and build another one!

I  have already talked about building techniques such as wood strip, stitch-and-glue, or skin on frame methods for building your kayak. So in this article, I am going to talk more about general styles of kayaks that you might come across if you’re out looking around. Now a quick look at Wikipedia gave me a list of about 17 different types of kayaks. Personally I think that’s making the discussion a little too complicated, so I’m going to keep our list a bit shorter and just talk about the following types of kayaks:

• Recreational
• Sit on top
• Fishing
• Whitewater
• Sea Kayaks
• Tandem Kayaks

I’ve also talked about some of the different shapes and features of kayaks in a little more technical detail in my article on Kayak Hull Shapes, Length, & Width. In that article I introduced some terms including “length overall”, “beam” and “rocker” and you will see those terms being used in the descriptions below. 

Recreational Kayak

Recreational kayaks are quite possibly the largest group of kayaks you’ll find since it is a bit of a catch all term. Now sometimes the label ‘recreational’ can get applied to a cheap, not very well designed kayak but that isn’t always the case. The characteristics that I think define a recreational kayak include:

• Moderate length – probably in the 10′ to 14′ range. This will give you a kayak that is big enough to hold an adult comfortably without looking like a monster
• Relatively wide beam – for example the Wood Duck 12′ by Chesapeake Light Craft has a 30″ beam. The Little Auk, which is a strip built recreational kayak by Guillemot Kayaks is a little narrower at a 28″ beam. This is wide enough to give a high initial stability, so that it doesn’t feel too tippy when a new kayaker starts to use it.
• Fairly large cockpit – a larger cockpit makes it easy for a paddler to get in and out of the kayak regardless of how flexible their joints might be. A larger cockpit can also be more comfortable for someone with a touch of claustrophobia. I know folks who are convinced they would be trapped if they ever flipped over in a kayak and having a larger cockpit opening helps to take away that fear.
• A little bit of rocker – this bit of upturn along the keel line will make it easy to turn the kayak. Of course the magic balance that everyone looks for in a recreational kayak is something that will let a new or novice paddler go straight when they want to but still let them turn without making it feel like they are paddling an oil tanker.

A couple of things that you will give up with a recreational kayak are:

• Speed – a recreational kayak won’t be as fast as a longer, narrower sea kayak will be. This is true with the same person paddling with the same amount of effort between the 2 kayak types.
• Rolling – once you learn how, doing an eskimo roll is a lot of fun. There are a few of characteristics that make it hard to roll a recreational kayak. First the wider beam means that it is harder to tip it over. This is true both when you are tipping it upside down and when you are trying to roll it back rightside up. Secondly that large cockpit that makes it easy to get in and out of your recreational kayak means that it will also take on water fast – even with a spray skirt on. The more water that gets in to your kayak, the harder it is to turn the big, heavy bathtub over again. Finally that large cockpit also means that you won’t have knee braces which you would have in a whitewater kayak and which are important to helping you roll.

Sit on Top Kayak

 A sit-on-top kayak is usually just a special case of a recreational kayak. Now you might argue that sit-on-top kayaks aren’t “real” kayaks, and many days I’d agree with you. However, as I’ve had time to think about it, I’ve decided that they have a pretty good purpose. The big advantage of a sit on top kayak is that you don’t have to get “in” it. For folks who aren’t comfortable being “stuck” in a traditional kayak, then a sit-on-top kayak gives them the opportunity to enjoy most of the benefits of a kayak including being able to sit down, rather than having to kneel, being able to use a double bladed paddle, and being able to easily handle the boat on their own. One example of a sit-on-top kayak that you can build yourself is the Sea Island Sport  which was designed by Nick Schade and which you can order as plans or as a kit from Chesapeake Light Craft. I found a few other designs for wooden sit-on-top kayaks, but they just reminded me why I don’t really like them.

Fishing Kayak

Making a kayak into a fishing kayak often has more to do with the toys that have been added on to the kayak than anything else. Pretty much any kayak can become a fishing kayak if you add a rod holder to it. A friend of mine has his rod holder bolted on to his polyethylene sea kayak and it works just fine for him.  In addition to a rod holder, I’ve seen kayaks with fish finders/depth finders mounted to the deck. I’ve also seen some neat hardware to mount an anchor from the bow and control the anchor line from the cockpit. Having the anchor mounted at the bow lets the kayak ride bow first into the wind & waves when you are anchored to fish and is a lot safer than having an anchor hanging from the middle of your kayak. So while admitting that making a kayak into a fishing kayak really has a lot to do with the outfitting, there are a couple of design features that also make for a good fishing kayak. First off is a fairly wide beam. This gives you that extra stability, just like a recreational kayak, so that you will be comfortable when reaching over the side to pull in that monster trout you finally hooked. You will probably also want a larger cockpit to give you room to dig around in your tackle box without having to watch your favourite lure slide off the deck.  The Wood Duck 12′ which I mentioned under the Recreational Kayak section is one that I’ve been thinking about building as a general purpose kayak for the cottage, including some extensive fishing. It’s extra beam at 30″ wide compared to the Little Auk with a beam of 28″ will give it that extra stability to make it a better fit for fishing.

Whitewater Kayak

 I haven’t found any links for building your own woodstrip, plywood or skin-on-frame whitewater kayak. This makes sense given how much abuse a whitewater kayak tends to take. Most whitewater kayaks that you’ll see these days will be made out of plastic, but I did find a “Design and build your own WW kayak” article that gives a high level walkthrough of building a fibreglass whitewater kayak. So what defines a whitewater kayak? Well these boats are designed to turn easily which means they are short – probably in the 7′ to 9′ range. They will have LOTS of rocker to help which again will let them turn on a dime. Whitewater kayaks do come in different flavours – river boats, creek boats, freestyle boats, and slalom boats. In general though, you will find that a modern whitewater kayak has a fairly flat hull shape which is intended for surfing on waves. That flat bottom can give you some fairly wide boats in the 26-27″ range on the higher volume kayaks intended for larger paddlers.

Sea Kayak

If recreational kayaks are the most common type of kayak, then the sea kayak is probably the most common type for folks to build themselves. This could just be because they look so darn beautiful, like Scott’s Endeavour on our home page. The characteristics that I think define a sea kayak include:

• Long – sea kayaks tend to be at least 16′ long but are usually in the 17′ to 19′ range. The extra length on a sea kayak is there for a couple of reasons. One is to help the kayak track easily which means it will be easy to keep it moving in a straight line. The other reason is to give you extra cargo space, since one reason for a larger sea kayak is to be able to do some overnight tripping.
• Relatively narrow beam – for example the Endeavour by Bear Mountain Boats has a waterline beam of 22″. The Chesapeake 17 by Chesapeake Light Craft is a little wider with a 24″ beam, but a Night Heron by Guillemot Kayaks is even narrower with a waterline beam of only 19.6″! This makes sea kayaks any where from 4″ to 10″ narrower than a typical recreational kayak.
• Fairly tight cockpit – now not all sea kayaks are going to have a tight cockpit, but on average they will be closer to the size of the cockpit on a whitewater kayak than the size the cockpit on a recreational kayak. The smaller cockpit opening allows for knee braces to be installed which give the paddler more control over the tilt and angle of the kayak
• Very little rocker – sea kayaks are pretty much at the opposit end of the spectrum from whitewater kayaks and will have a very flat keel line.  However, while a sea kayak isn’t going to spin on a dime like a 9′ whitewater playboat can, they still turn very easily and gracefully. This is done by “heeling” or tilting the kayak in the direction of your turn. Doing this takes advantage of the curve along the side of the kayak to lift or ‘free’ the bow and stern of the kayak effectively shortening the keel line and letting the kayak turn more quickly.

Tandem Kayaks

A tandem kayak is a ‘kayak built for two’. Looking for tandem kayaks, I found that they tend to be stretched versions of other sea kayak designs. The length is typically kept to about 21′  or less , which is a bit longer than a typical sea kayak but still about the minimum you need to add to fit a second set of legs into the same boat. Now in order to keep the length under control, you still have to add some extra volume to hold the additional weight of a second paddler. To take a look at another Guillemot kayak as an example, the tandem Great Auk Double has a waterline beam of 24.3″ compared to a waterline beam of 22.7″ for the solo Great Auk. Similarly, Chesapeake Light Crafts Chesapeake Double has a beam of 30″ compared to the 24″ beam of the Chesapeake 17.

Back in the 1980′s I was a teenager with a passion for the water and a dream of building my own boat. Any boat probably would have done as long as it was made out of wood, but a cedar strip canoe would be ideal. Now I had some reasonable woodworking skills but for the most part it was just a dream. Then sometime around 1987 I came across an ad for Canoecraft: An Illustrated Guide to Fine Woodstrip Construction by Ted Moores. I bought the book that summer and promptly read it cover to cover. By spring I had the station molds for the Chestnut Prospector drawn out but it would be another 4 years before I actually got to build my first canoe. Not only did that canoe float (and it still does today ), it also got a lot of praise for it’s beautiful looks. Of course I could see the flaws, but most folks were willing to overlook them.

Well around 1999, Ted Moores realized that you could use the same approach to building kayaks and he came out with Kayakcraft: Fine Woodstrip Kayak Construction.

This is the book that Scott and I worked from to build his Endeavour Sea Kayak. So we can show you that this instructions in this book really do work, but what does it cover?

After a quick introduction we get treated to a thorough discussion of kayak design that was contributed by Steve Killing who is the designer of the Endeavour Sea Kayak among many other boats. Ted then walks us through the kayak building process step by step from machining the planking and building the jig through creating the skeleton of stems and sheer clamps, planking & sanding the hull and deck, fibreglassing and then the detailed finishing.

One of the things I really like about both Kayakcraft: Fine Woodstrip Kayak Construction and Canoecraft: An Illustrated Guide to Fine Woodstrip Construction is that they both include the full offset tables for the kayak and canoe designs in the book. Now before you get too excited, these aren’t full sized ready to use plans. What the offset tables give you are the detailed measurements to let you plot out the full sized station molds on graph paper. Nonetheless, after a few winter evenings drawing out the station molds, you’ll be ready to head to the workshop to start building.

OK, I know you might not have even had a chance to build your first kayak yet and the last thing you probably want to think about is ever having to repair it. But, for some of us the time does come when we need to strip off some old fibreglass. I’ve personally had to do it with a cedarstrip canoe. When I did it I ended up using a belt sander, which worked better than I expected but it was still fairly time consuming. I had checked around for some other options but I hadn’t heard anything better at the time.
Since then I have heard more and more people recommending that you use a heat gun to strip the fibreglass in much the same way you would use it to remove old paint. After seeing this YouTube video, I’m convinced that the next time I need to strip some fibreglass I’ll be trying the heat gun approach.

Kayaks You Can Build: An Illustrated Guide to Plywood Construction by Ted Moores & Greg Rossel is the second book you should buy if you are thinking about building a plywood kayak.

This book is split into 6 chapters but I would argue that it is really 3 broad sections. The first couple of chapters cover some history of kayaks and how to choose the kayak that is right for you. All good stuff, but still the sort of thing you’ll find in just about any kayak building book. Ted & Greg are veterans in the boat building world and promptly got that background stuff out of the way in the first 20 pages.
The second big section of the book, chapters 3-5, is what I think is an invaluable resource for anyone building a plywood kayak. These chapters cover Setting up the Shop, Tools, Materials and Supplies, and Plywood Boat-Building Techniques. These chapters are loaded with step by step instructions, discussions, and pictures that take you through all the building steps for a plywood kayak. For all that I liked Chris Kulzycki’s The New Kayak Shop, these are the kind of instructions that I was looking for.

The final section of the book is chapter 6 – A Kayak Builder’s Journal. In this section Ted & Greg walk you through their own building of three different plywood kayaks. The three kayaks are The Coho by Pygmy Boats, the Mill Creek 13 by Chesapeake Light Craft, and the 17′ 4″ Enterprise by Bear Mountain Boats. This final section provides even more step by step building details for each of the 3 kayaks that it covers. I’d say this Journal is a real bonus section if you choose to build one of these specific kayaks.

So if I like this book so much, why is it only the second book I would buy to help build a plywood kayak? Well the answer is really simple. It doesn’t give you the plans for any of the kayaks. That’s where you’ll need to go back and either order a kit, buy a set of plans or loft them from a book like The New Kayak Shop. Nonetheless, once the kit arrives and you’re standing in your shop wondering where to begin, or how to use the epoxy, or why the pieces just aren’t lining up – then you’ll be glad you bought Kayaks You Can Build: An Illustrated Guide to Plywood Construction

One of our goals here at Building a Kayak is to not just spout out our own ideas, but also to help you find links to useful resources elsewhere on the web. So with that in mind, I thought this teleseminar from Glen-L Marine might be useful to others. Glen-L has a huge repository of boat plans, ranging from the 8′ Tiny Titan to a 49′ Klondike trawler yacht. While not one of the more common sources of kayak plans, they do offer a few including the Kidyak, the Can-Yak, the solo Sea Kayak and the tandem Sea Kayak Two.

I have subscribed to Glen-L’s newsletter for a number of years, but only recently have they started offering teleseminars. In this particular teleseminar, Gayle Brantuk from Glen-L is interviewing Kern Hendricks who is a chemical engineer and the owner of System Three resins. I figured that if you were looking for input on how best to use your epoxy, you probably can’t get a better source than going direct to the owner of one of the most common epoxies out there. Here is the link to the “System Three Teleseminar with Kern Hendricks”.

The New Kayak Shop by Chris Kulczycki is a standard resource for anyone who is thinking about building a stitch-and-glue plywood kayak. Chris is the founder of Chesapeake Light Craft and The New Kayak Shop is the updated version of his original The Kayak Shop.

This book covers the full sequence of building a plywood stitch-and-glue kayak from design considerations through to the outfitting details. Included in the book are plans for the Chesapeake 16 and West River 180 sea kayaks, along with the Severn flatwater kayak.

There are a couple of things to keep in mind as you read the book. When you are working through Chapter Five: The Plans, you will probably notice that no offsets or measurements are provided for the plywood deck sections. Don’t worry, this is on purpose. Over the years, Chris has found that tracing the shape of the deck sections from the kayak once you have the hull built works out best. The next thing to remember is that with any kayak project book, you really do need to read it pretty much cover to cover. I spent a fair bit of time while reading wondering if plywood stitch and glue construction really could be as easy as Chris makes it out to be. By the end of the book I’m convinced that it’s all there.

To quote from Chapter One: The Wooden Kayak – “The hardest part of building your own kayak is getting started.” So what are you waiting for?

Kayaks come in a wide variety of lengths, widths, and shapes. These differences really do affect how the kayak will handle and respond on the water. Understanding the terms used to describe the kayak specs will both help you compare different kayak designs and help you choose a kayak that will fit your paddling activities.

With apologies for my artistic abilities (or lack thereof), I’ll try introduce some of the key terms that you will come across when looking at kayak designs.

Length Overall (“LOA”) vs. Waterline Length (“LWL”)

An easy starting point is to look at the difference between the Length Overall and the Waterline Length (or Length Water Line) as it applies to a kayak. As shown in the illustration below, the Length Overall is simply the maximum length of the kayak. This is the measurement that you are going to care most about when deciding whether this kayak will fit in your garage or workshop for building or storage. The Waterline Length is then the length of the kayak hull that should be measured flush with the water level when the kayak is carrying it’s designed load.

This introduces the term “design waterline”. When a kayak, or any other boat, is designed, one of the goals that the designer takes into consideration is the weight that the kayak is expected to hold. If the kayak is under loaded, it will sit higher in the water. If the kayak is overloaded it will sit lower in the water.

Coming back to length, length can be important because it is related to the theoretical maximum speed of the kayak. I say theoretical both because there is a theoretical limit to hull speed, but more importantly because most of us don’t paddle anywhere near the top speed of our kayaks for more than a minute or two at a time. Nonetheless, a longer kayak will tend to be faster that a shorter kayak, especially if they are similar in other aspects.

Length can also be related to tracking – how easy it is to keep the kayak moving in a straight line. A longer kayak will track well, meaning that it will tend to keep moving straight without require a lot of steering or correction strokes. In contrast a short kayak will turn more easily which is a good thing for a whitewater kayak which needs to turn quickly, but is less desirable in a lake tripping or sea kayak where you want to go straight for a relatively long time.

Maximum Beam vs. Waterline Beam

Beam is really just another word for the width of a boat or kayak. Since most kayaks tend to flare out from the waterline to the gunwale, the maximum beam is normally going to be wider than the waterline beam. Beam is relevant to both speed and stability of your kayak. A kayak with a narrow beam will tend to be faster than an equal length kayak with a wider beam. On the other hand, the wider kayak will provide more stability from side to side. This stability can be useful for a new kayaker and is also something that folks will look for in a fishing kayak.

Illustration of the meaning of maximum beam and waterline beam for a kayak.

Rocker

Rocker is a measure of how much the keel of kayak curves up from the middle of the hull to the bow or stern. A bigger rocker ‘frees up’ the bow or stern to let the kayak turn more easily. Understanding the effect of rocker is important when comparing 2 kayaks with the same length. The kayak with the greater degree of water will turn more easily, with less effort, but won’t track quite as well.  

Illustration of rocker on a kayak, including the difference in rocker between a sea kayak and a whitewater kayak

Now, while I haven’t illustrated it, keep in mind that as you tilt a kayak on it’s side, you will change the portion of the hull that is in the water and as a result the effective rocker of the hull. This helps to explain why a long sea kayak with a relatively small rocker can carve such beautiful turns when tilted into the turn.

Hull Shapes

The final characteristic that we’ll look at in this article is hull shape. The illustration below compares a relatively flat bottomed hull to a round or arched bottom and to a “vee” bottom hull. The cross section shape of the hull relates to the primary and secondary stability of the hull. For a detailed description of primary stability and secondary stability you can take a look at KayakWiki. In simple terms, primary stability defines how tippy a boat feels when you first get in to it  and secondary stability defines how that tippiness changes as the boat tilts to one side or the other. With a flat bottomed hull, you have a relatively high initial or primary stability which means that it takes a fair bit of effort to start tipping the kayak. However, once you have the kayak starting to tip, it will have a relatively low secondary stability and want to quickly go right over on it’s side. In contrast, a rounded or arched hull will have a lower initial stability and will happily start to lean to the side, but since the hull shape is very similar whether the kayak is straight upright or tilted, the rounded hull will have a higher secondary stability. Looking at the “vee” shaped hull, I have drawn a relatively shallow “vee”. This shape will likely be similar in stability to the rounded or arched hull, but the “vee” can provide more of a keel to help the kayak resist being blown sideways by the wind. If the “vee” was a sharper angle, then it would have lower primary stability but would firm up with a relatively high secondary stability as the kayak leans onto the relatively flat sides of the hull.

Illustration of flat bottomed, round or arched, and “vee” shaped hull cross sections of a kayak.