: It?s pouring rain outside. What better
: weather than to build a boat in?

Rain?!? Crap, I am supposed to go skiing there this weekend.....hopefully Alyeska is getting the white stuff.

: removed the bricks and mylar to find several joints coated perfectly,
: while others have small ?dishes?, gaps, and air spaces under saturated
: glass! What gives?! I suppose some were from air bubbles I didn?t evacuate
: before laying the mylar down. I?m working in a temp controlled shop so I
: know rising temps is not an issue. Could the wood have absorbed THAT much
: epoxy? Oh, and I used warm epoxy, about 80 degrees F.

Could be a lot of reasons for the air pockets. But I guess you probably didn't have enough of a saturation slathering below the tape or didn't fully wet out the tape. Lay down a good saturation coat, then tape, fill the tape, and paint more epoxy on. I like to stay with mine for a few minutes to make sure the tape is fully wetted out and dabbing out air bubbles that appear, before putting down the mylar and bricks. Also, I only did the insides before stitching my hull together (see my post below with pic, I'm afraid I'm going to launch before you).
80 for the epoxy is probably overkill, a little cooler will give you more working time.

: I really thought I was being careful!

You were. I learned a great many things on my first boat. I have to laugh at some of the things i figured out the hard way.

: Second question, to what extent are you supposed to smooth the epoxy on those
: butt seams? Should I just knock the edges off? Or should I
: smoooooooooooooth it out with sharp carbide scraper and sand paper so it
: ?feathers? into the wood, all pretty ?n all, like I?m building a coffee
: table?

On the inside, I will just wait and knock the edges off so the glass lays flat on the inside of the hull. That is quite a while later in the process.

Hang in there. Don't be afraid to re-do some of the joints if they are really ugly. I had to redo one I broke.
cheers - - -shawn