Actually, there are no "true" cedars native to the United States. Each U.S. "cedar" belongs to it's own genus. A true cedar has deciduous leaves and most are found in Europe. Anyway, I used Alaska yellow cedar (Chamaecyparis nootkatensis) for a couple of stripes for accent on my Expedition Single. It is about twice as dense as red cedar so I limited its use to trim pieces. My problem was with planing it. It is harder than red cedar and tended to pull my plane into the wood causing gouges. I had to stop planing and try sanding. This was difficult as the red cedar sanded much easier and the yellow cedar stripe tended to make a hump. It looks nice, but was quite a lot of work. Because the yellow cedar is dense, it is also much stiffer so the idea of using thinner strips is a good one. I also made mine 1/2' wide instead of 3/4" to help with the stiffness problem on tight bends. The yellow color turned even brighter after glassing. It took some getting used to, but I like it.
> From my limited (previous) research on the Web, Alaskan Yellow Cedar =
> Pacific Coast Cypress = Pacific Yellow Cedar, but the wood is neither
> actually a cedar nor cypress. It is not the same cypress found in the
> Southeast U.S., nor a type of cedar, like red or white we are familiar
> with. I didn't (and perhaps still don't) understand the terminology, but
> if we are talking about the same thing, this is a "sunshine"
> yellow wood, fairly dense, with a faint grain pattern that isn't revealed
> when the wood is wet or coated with epoxy. It carves beautifully with a
> hand plane, but seems heavy, and I don't know how difficult it would be to
> bend in a complicated strip-built application.

> John