Bob
I also am a first time builder and readily admit that my methods are not the prefered or best. However, my experience with this boat has been that strip thickness was not nearly as big a deal as I thought it would be. I had a go-no go guage made in our machine shop at work with a tolerance of .26 top and .23 bottom. My goal was that I would not use any strip that fell outside either larger or smaller. The reality after I cut up a very nice $30 plank of redwood to slightly smaller, probably .22 or so was that I decided to go ahead and put it on and deal with the extra sanding etc.
I should probably also say that I have not been using bead and cove, I think strip thickness would be much more critical to get the cove edges uniform. I am hoping to use bead and cove on my next boat and will improve my strip cutting by either buying a nice table saw or mooching off of my friend who has a great one.
I was using my rip saw run through a piece of plywood with a 4x4 for a fence. Not what I would call ideal but it worked. I will end up doing more sanding to get the surface uniform but I think the finished product will be just fine.

I have run on long enough, I hope this helps. I have enjoyed every part of the building process, take your time and have fun!