: You might also consider splitting the first couple of feet of a regular strip
: too. A utility knife and steady hand are sufficient. I did this on the two
: Returns I am building and it worked like a charm. I think I saw the idea
: here somewhere, so thanks to who ever that was! The edges of the split
: halves may not sit perfectly in line with each other, but that can be
: sanded/planed/scraped out later.

: Bill
: Bill

I agree that splitting worked well for me also, after doing steaming, soaking, steam ironing and hot gunning (I never tried the boiled water mentioned above). The rolling bevel strip that mated the deck strip to the shear was something that I did but really never knew how I did it or quite figured out what was going on. My first one (I had four to do) I did by hand with planes and files and sanding and still wasn't sure what I was after. The last three I cheated making them by using a two part plastic much like auto body putty that I mixed up and just mashed the strip into the plastic in the rolling bevel area and then shaped it after it set up. Even then I had to keep going back and looking at my first strip to see what I was after. I think somehow I was making it harder then it should have been.

John