: We finished lofting and cutting out the 6 canoe panels in the rough this
: weekend, meaning we cut them well outside the lines and will need to clamp
: and plane them. Wow, lofting is tedious and backbreaking! Not to mention
: eye crossing. But we now have panels that we can actually see a canoe
: shape in, which is pretty exciting.

: Still have to plane, as I mentioned, plus bevel the edges per the lengthy
: discussion last week, plus do a saturation coat of epoxy, plus build the
: strongback, before we can even contemplate stitching, but my mind always
: wanders ahead to try to get a handle on what's coming up.

: All you experienced S&G folks who didn't build from a kit with predrilled
: holes, how do you get started? How do I line up two adjoining panels to
: drill opposing holes and be sure the ends are going to some together? The
: wood can't be bent to hold it together in shape to check it out. I believe
: you are supposed to start stitching in the middle and go out to the ends,
: but what if your starting point is incorrect and you get done only to find
: that the ends don't come together right? I can envision having to take it
: apart and drill additional holes to shift it one way or another and ending
: up with a solid row of holes along the edge, significantly weakening it.

: Thanks for any thoughts and advice,

: Patsy

I'm not sure I'd call my self experinced, however here are some thoughts.

1) Do start marking from one end. I started from one of my vertical lines about 2 ft from one end...This was just plain dumbass not thinking on my part. Of course the vertical line which I had used for lofting did not cross both panels at the same point . I ended up off 3/8ths to a 1/2 an inch offset in the alignment on my bottom panels, to side panel joint. You can see this in almost any of my hull pictures for my hybrid that show either end from the side. check out www.cadvision.com/tantonm/kayak/kayak.html ( I did not fix it, as mentioned in my diary )

To transfer the points I had a scap of 1/4 x 1/4 x 4 ft inch cedar around. I marked it every 3 or 4 inches. then used that to transfer the points to the edges of the panels. The strip could bend with the curve in the panel. That worked pretty well.

Well, good luck, I'm sure it will turn out better than what I did.

Myrl