> Call me hard headed but I made my own "skeleton" for a kayak
> that would fit my needs I also bought Nick`s book on strip-buildind a sea
> kayak and its very helpful, BUT I want to use a red ceader and a yellow
> wood more then likely pine to make a design.

I used Western red cedar and yellow pine as well. The boat is a bit heavier than if it were all cedar, but still weighs in at 43 lbs. with Nick's expedition layup schedule. You may save a little weight by using spruce for the light wood.

> My question is if your sheer line runs down the boat from one end to the
> other how do you twist those pieces around??

One way is to establish the boundaries of your pattern before any other strips. These boundaries can go wherever you wish, over, under or through the sheerline. Eventually you will need to cut the crossing strips (if any) with a razor saw before you glass the inside.

> My next question is wouldn't be better to have the cove and bead on the sheer > line too, that point would stand out on the finished kayak wouldn't it?

Not necessarily. The difficulty with cove and bead on the sheer is that the edge gets pretty badly beaten up during the process, and the "feathers" on the edge of the cove are particularly fragile. A careful job of planing that edge will result in no gaps at all, and the joint will not show. Some guys don't do cove and bead at all, but rather plane all the strips on the boat. Nick used to do that, and some old-timers still do as well. My whole deck is 1/4" x 1/4" strips, planed on both sides, no coves or beads. It took a good while longer that way, but the graphics look better. Cove and bead on 1/4" or 3/8" strips, maybe even 1/2" 'ers is more trouble than it is worth.