Sewing Skin on a Greenland Style Kayak


Click on Thumbnail for an enlarged picture.

Polyester spread over frame (17,713 bytes) Aligning fabric (14,196 bytes) Tightening and Pinning in place (15,317 bytes) More tightening and pinning. (14,308 bytes) After pinning. (13,563 bytes)
The whole boat after pinning. (19,878 bytes) After trimming off most of the excess fabric. (22,319 bytes) Sewing the seam around an 1/8 The seam cord. (10,169 bytes) View of the cord and progressing sewing. (11,101 bytes)
Close up of sewing. Fine stitches. (16,771 bytes) Pushing needle back through the hole. (14,234 bytes) Close up of tip. (12,409 bytes) Bottome side of tip. (14,741 bytes) Closing up the tip. (13,628 bytes)
Sewing of stern completed. (16,554 bytes) On the front I used coarser stitches. (35,437 bytes) The seam cords were looped around the coaming and pulled tight to the stem. (21,062 bytes) Holes in the fabric due to pulling to much with the stitches. (29,103 bytes) Sewing fabric to coaming. Stitches looped around a cord and back through the coaming. (18,947 bytes)
Thread looped from hole to hole below the cord. (17,452 bytes) Overall boat before ironing. (19,744 bytes) Foredeck before ironing. (11,005 bytes) Before Ironing. (12,500 bytes) After ironing (13,318 bytes)
The iron. (13,947 bytes)

I used the system of sewing the seam described by Robert Morris. This incorporates some corder sewn in like "piping" to provide a raised seam. It struck me as on of the cleaner looking methods.

[Ribs | Bending a Coaming | Installing Stringers | Deck and Coaming ]

<-Back To The Skin-on-Frame Page

©2002 Nick Schade -All Rights Reserved.

High Performance Wooden Sea Kayak Designs
Send snail-mail to:

Guillemot Kayaks
824 Thompson St, Suite I
Glastonbury, CT 06033

Phone/Fax: (860) 659-8847
Email Guillemot Kayaks
© Nick Schade - All Rights Reserved