My S&G Walrus has WRC for the shear clamp and seems fine, I know Mike Hanks also has used it for his fleet of Walri.

I glassed the inside of the panels before installing, then the outside hull, then the deck overlapping the joint by a few inches. Also coated the shear strips with epoxy to waterproof them.

Cedar is used for many SOF's also, I think the stresses would be much higher on these than on a boat with full plywood panels.

Ben Staley

: Hi Michael, You will want to check with Eric Schade but I'm balking at the
: idea that Western Red Cedar would not make a suitable shear clamp. I built
: a 17' S&G boat. The shear clamp (in this context) is mostly a gluing
: surface and really doesn't have to be that stout; the adjoining planes
: will act to reinforce each other.

: I'm reading the Adirondak Guideboat book now. Builders have been using
: softwoods this way for generations. There are stronger softwoods out there
: but WRC is very strong and, for this application, it's splitting hairs.