Carbon Fiber on a Kayak Coaming, Here's How

Sun, 23 Aug 2026 20:35:37 +0000

In this build episode, I prep the deck of the Little Auk for glassing and lay down a fill coat of epoxy, sanding and getting the surface ready for a clean, glass-clear finish. From there, I shift to the cockpit: building up the coaming from plywood laminations, then wrapping it in carbon fiber using my pre-preg method.

Pre-pregging carbon lets me control resin content precisely instead of fighting for saturation on a curved, vertical surface, no drips, no dry spots, no excess weight from pooled epoxy. It's a different problem than wetting out glass on a flat deck, and this video walks through why the approach changes when the substrate does.

If you're building any strip/hybrid kayak and want to see how the coaming comes together, laminated plywood core, carbon skin, pre-preg technique and all, this one's for you.

“If you’re going to make it, make it beautiful.”
Bob Emser

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