During the winter months 1999/2000 I built me a Volkskayak (VK).  The Volkskayak is a stitch and glue Greenland style kayak, designed by Gerry Gladwin. It is a hard chined kayak design made from two bottom panels, two shear panels, and two deck panels.  It features waterproof bulkheads.   4mm marine plywood, East-System Epoxy, and fiberglass tape are the main building components.  Since I know my gentle and docile nature I added a additional layer of 6oz fiberglass cloth to the bottom of my boat -a wise decision. The main reason for me to built one of Gerry's boats was the option to built the break down version, the Volkskomponentkayak (VKK).
I built my boat in one of Gerry's workshops and he provided precutted plywood panels. My first job was it to drill the stitching holes into the two bottom panels and the two shear panels. The first couple of hours I spent stitching the panels with brass wire to each other.  Here the two bottom panels are joint and the shear panels are partly stitched to the bottom.  A spacer wood keeps the beam with to the maximum beam of 24 inches.  A few hundred twisted wires later the hull had already kayak shape. After installing the shear clamps -glued in with epoxy and hold temporarily in place with a couple of screws from the outside- the front and aft bulkheads were installed.  The bulkheads for my VKK were made from 8mm plywood each.  They were doubled with a sheet of cardboard in between and then stitched in place.  The doubled bulkheads are the secret of the VKK.  But first you have to built the kayak like a regular VK.  After I finished stitching the four hull panels together, and with the bulkheads in space it was time to fit the deck. First the two deck panels were stitched to each other.  Than the peak of the deck was fitted to the bulkheads and the deck shape was fixed with metal brackets.  After stitching everything together the last thing to do on the first day of work was  glueing the panels to each other with epoxy.  The epoxy was supplemented with silica to a peanut butter consistency.  With a putty knife the glue was pushed in all the seams between the panels to hold them finally in place. Epoxy cures in a few hours, and the first thing to do on the next morning was to pull out all the wires and clean the seams from excessive epoxy.  This is a point were accurate work in the evening saves a lot of work in the morning.  The boat was then ready for the next step.  The inside seams of the boat were covered with 4 inch fiberglass tape and fiberglass and wood was coated with several layers of unthickened epoxy.  The same procedure was done on the inside of the deck.  Putty knife and foam rollers were used to do the coating. Then deck and hull were joined.  With lots of thickened epoxy on shear clamps and bulkheads the deck was fixed with hundreds of screws to the hull.  All the screws were removed after the epoxy had cured.  At this point the spacers for the cockpit coaming were also glued on to the deck.  I choose to built my cockpit a bit narrower and shorter than the standard VK cockpit.  The next big step was to shape the boat, i.e. to get a smooth and round transition between deck and shear. After the epoxy had cured and all the screws were removed the cockpit rim was glued on top of the spacer. Custom made clamps held the rim in place while the epoxy cured.  With disc grinder, planer and sandpaper a first finishing job was done to get a smooth, clean surface, and the boat would have been ready for the final exterior epoxy coating.  But this wasn't a regular VK, it was going to become a VKK! After I cut the hatch openings into the front and rear deck of my boat, Gerry handled the jig saw for the dangerous part.  I was to nervous and to afraid to mess it up.  The cuts to transform the VK into a VKK had to be exactly in between the doubled bulkheads.  Before the kayak was cut into pieces we drilled the bolt holes into the bulkheads and inserted the stainless steel bolts.  One reason was to ensure a good fit later, and to prevent the plywood from breaking under the load of bow or stern.   The result of this operation was an almost finished kayak cut into 3 pieces. The bow section, the cockpit section, and the stern section.  Each section with its own waterthight bulkheads.  Now the outside of the bulkheads was encapsulated in epoxy, taped with fiberglass tape and covered with fiberglass cloth.  An additional coat of fairing compound ensured a snug fit of the bulkhead surfaces after bolting the boat back together.  Then the outside seams of the boat were taped and the outside plywood was sealed with serveral coats of epoxy.  After a lot of sanding the kayak was ready for the paint job.  I wanted my boat in bright colors for good visibility on the water.  Therefore the hull was going to be painted all white, with the deck in red and yellow.  But first was a primer sprayed onto the surface to get an even smother finish.  The whole paint job was done with a spray gun, resulting in an almost fiberglass look.  The extensive paintjob resulted in a very nice looking boat, but also added a couple of pounds to the total weight of the boat. My completly outfitted kayak, with seat, backrest, foot braces, bilge pump, knee and thight braces comes to a total of 55 pounds. Heavy compared with the single piece VK (30 pounds) but still competetive with many commercial plastic and fiberglass boats.  Since it was still winter when my kayak was finished and there was no way for sea trials I started to add artwork to bow and stern.  Even if the Haida never paddled kayaks, I like their art and legends. The raven plays an important role in their mythology and I choose the raven to grace my kayaks bow.  Instead of a Haida canoe he is paddling a VK.  Later I added an eye and whale to the art collection, still thinking about other motives.

Spring was reason to assemble my VKK for the first real paddle (pool sessions doesn't count).  Before heading out to the water the kayak needs to be assembled.  After carrying the 3 pieces from my apartment to the elevator and from the elevator to the park deck is handyman time.  It takes roughly 20 minutes to tighten the 12 nuts with the wrench.   The yellow discs are gaskets made from 3mm close cell foam to prevent water creeping through the threads and bolt holes.  They are simply pushed over the bolts and sit between the bulkheads. I think they are not realy a must, since in one of the pool sessions I forgot to put them in and nothing happend.  The bow and stern compartments were bone dry.  The bolt in the front end of the cockpit are glues in.  The nuts are placed and thightened through the front hatch cover.  The bolts to connect cockpit and stern are not glued in.  This would prevent it to store the pieces standing upright.  But it is anyway much easier to join stern and cockpit, because the bulkheads, bolts, and nuts are easy to reach through cockpit and rear hatch.  After the assembly the only thing left to do is to tie the kayak thigh to the car rack, load the paddling gear and head for the water.