I have designed a whitewater freestyle kayak. I am now planning to make it using composites. But this is where my predicament begins. I have a limited budget, but I need to make a mould (in 2 pieces) and the boat. The boat is likely to take some big impacts with the water ( not huge but substantial enough to cause damage if not well made) Can anyone help with what I should make the moulds out of and make the boat out of? My knowledge of composites is quite limted so any help would be great! 

Hi,

Sounds like a good project, we'd be very happy to help where we can.

For your moulds, I would certainly suggest our Uni-Mould system. It uses a vinylester gelcoat (which is compatible the with epoxy resin that you'll use to make the kayak itself) and a low-cost but zero-shrink resin system that means you can make a strong, cost effective set of moulds that won't 'pull' (so the splits will come together nicely without any wrestling!) that can be used over and over.

You'll find lots of information about the Uni-Mould system on this forum and also in this Uni-Mould Advantages and Laminating Guide and we also use it on our How to Make a Carbon Fibre Bonnet video; Uni-Mould is featured throughout the first video.

For the Kayak itself, certainly the most respected method of laminating the hulls at the moment is resin infused epoxy. Resin infusion is another subject well covered on this forum and also in the video (linked to above) and also in our Video Guide to Perfect Resin Infusion. The laminate I would suggest for a Kayak hull (and this is really personal preference, it's your boat design!) would be something like 3 layers of carbon/kevlar hybrid. The carbon part fo the fibre adds the ultimate stiffness (meaning you can have an incredibly light hull) and the kevlar adds excellent impact and abrasion resistance. Very soon we will actually be stocking a brand new material which is carbon/Twaron hybrid. Just like carbon/kevlar it offers exactly the same amount of protection but the Twaron is a black fibre that will not fade in sunlight and so effectively looks like pure carbon (so very cool ) but also has the protective properties of carbon/kevlar (without the issue of UV degradation that can be a problem with kevlar fibres).

You would infuse the hull using IN-2 Epoxy Infusion Resin, it's rated for marine use, it's incredibly strong and tough and infuses beautifuly.

I hope this helps and look forward to working with you.

Best regards, Matt

Matt Statham
Easy Composites / Carbon Mods - Technical Sales