: John,
: I strip the tail sections of my baidarkas from the sheer line down. I don't
: strip
: right to the keel line because I want to bring strips in from the main hull
: to
: tie things together.

: In your picture you seem to be stripping from the keel up. This IS making
: things
: harder for yourself. As I indicate in the instructions there WILL BE several
: wedged shaped
: filler or cheater strips needed to be inserted on the #12 station. The
: station is
: curved and the stem is a vertical line. This means there must be more strips
: on the #12
: station to cover the same apparent vertical height on the tail stem.

: I would suggest removing the strip or two on the keel of your tail section
: where strips
: from the hull will naturally run into it. If you do not you will have the
: added problem
: of scarfing them into the hull strips.

: Review those instructions! Good Luck!

: All the best,

: Rob

Hi Rob,

Keep an eye on me. I know I am deviating from your instructions and it is hard to envision what any consequences will be down the road. As you say, I am running into one problem with the strips matching from the main hull to the stern section. Before I started to strip the stern section I had two considerations that determined how I would strip the whole boat. As you may remember, one was the height and placement of the White Pine part of the hull into the transition of the Western Red Cedar. I spent a great deal of time getting this just right with line up strings all over the yak. The strings allow me to adjust a couple of stations so the deck would be more fair and then adjust the strings for the pine/WRC transition line so that it looked absolutely straight. The second consideration is the feature strip that will be the shear strip also. It has to be 1 ¾" wide because I want it to match exactly the width of your upper bow piece and flow from there to the stern. Only after doing this could I start stripping the stern section. Your plans show three ¾" strips starting from the shear down at the stern, and this would be ¼" less then what I will have, messing up your stripping setup. I think. This is a lot to roll over in my mind and not actually see it. The feature strip will be very fragile for a shear strip and I wanted to lock the station sections as securely as I can with all of the stripping from the keel that I can do before putting on the feature strip. My thinking may not be correct but that is why I am doing it this way.

Take care,
John