: I will begin stripping my first wooden-strip kayak (Guillemot Expedition)
: next week. I will be using cove-and- bead strips as well as planned
: beveled strips.
: I have carpenters glue, hot glue gun, stapler, duct tape, packing tape,
: spring clamps, c- clamps, sheetrock screws, dowels, straps, mirror clamps,
: bungee elastic chords and "Super Glue".

: My questions are.
: 1. How much liquid or hot glue do I use?
: 2. How often and where do I place the hot glue?
: 3. After the hot glue cools. Can it be sanded or does it need to be removed?
: 4. Is there a special hot glue sick that works best?
: 5. Has anyone used "SUPER GLUE"?
: I enjoy the bulletin board and I'm looking forward to your inputs.
: Thank You, Paul in Tennessee

I like hot glue. I use hot glue TO TACK STRIPS TO STATIONS on the deck and hull sides of my boats and I use staples for the hull bottom where they are not visable.

Make certain you use only hot glue designed for holding wood which is usually yellow in color.

Hot glue WILL NOT adhere to masking tape, or any other tape, so seal the station edges with ONE coat of fast drying shellac. You want the glue to stick to the stations.

Western red cedar is the best wood to use with hot glue. The hot glue holds well and releases without pulling out chunks of wood.

Dry fitting each strip will make your joint tighter and you will have not surprises during glue up. Center your strip on the boat holding it to the previous strips with spring clamps. Mark alignment at the boat center with an "X". I used to use just a slash but found I sometimes lined up the wrong ones. Then fit the strip to each stem. If you need more holding power as your clamp to each stem, drive a sheet rock screw into the station behind the strip(stem side) about 3/16” in from the edge and apply a spring clamp. Spring clamp the strip ends at the stems and cut off excess leaving about two inches past each stem. If your strip fits tightly with only spring clamps it will be perfect once you apply the hot glue to the stations and edge glue it in place.

Dry fitting each strip is well worth the effort and will improve the smoothness and joints between strips tremendously. If your prefitted strip goes in place well, you know it will fit perfectly once it's glued in place. I can't beleive how much time and energy people waste on elaberate stapleless methods that only allow a couple strips a day to be applied. If they put this energy into prefitting strips, they're finished boat would look much better

Use carpenter's glue on the strip edges.

Use as small an amount of hot glue as possible. Small amounts of hot glue set up faster, release more easily, yet hold very well.

Holding the strip in place while the hot glue hardens is okay in the middle of your boat but will not work at the stems. It is easy to become impatient and let go too early. You may come back to this spot and find the strip has moved out of alignment.

To hold the strip in place while the hot glue sets, drive a sheet rock screw (a hardened screw) into the station about 3/16” in from the edge, behind the strip. Apply the hot glue and clamp the strip in place with a small spring clamp.
Clamp strips BETWEEN stations with spring clamps and use dabs of hot glue ON THE STRIP JOINT to hold the strip edges in alignment after the clamp is removed in 60 seconds.

This system will allow you to apply stapleless strips nearly as fast as with staples.

HOWEVER, you cannot use this system with Nick's internal strongback. The stations can only be removed without damaging the glassed hull and deck by knocking the stations toward the hull center by a hard blow of a mallet against a Large screw driver placed against the station. An internal strongback will obviously make this difficult.

I used to try to remove the deck by wedging a hand saw blade between the deck and stations but sometimes I caused stress to the glass which shows up as white specks. This can be repaired, but the knock out method works perfectly.

Remove hot glue with a paint scraper.

All the best,
Rob Macks