Folding Kayaks Forum

I am new to the world of kayak building, and it's very exciting! I'd like to build my own kayak at the lowest possible price and likely based on Marcel's folder.
I have a few basic questions:
Does anyone know why bamboo is or isn't a good material instead of his aluminum tubes?
I'm tempted to just fool around with building one without following a set pattern, but modeling it mostly off of Marcel's. What kind of obstacles have people run into when building from scratch?
How do I guarantee it will be the right size for me?
Thank you in advance for answering any or all of my questions

You may get more answers to your questions on the Greenland kayaking forums over at http://www.qajaqusa.org

There are far more builders of skin on frame boats over there than on this site and I recall a couple of discussion strings in past years about use of bamboo for framing.

You do have to enroll to use the forums (no cost) and the site rules are that you must use your real name. But there is a lot of good information on building SOF's to be found there.

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