I'd tend to think that if you can force it to fit, then its probably not too much force. Somewhere there's a formula for the amount of springback in a lamination, I forget exactly but as I recall it takes about 5 layers to get the springback down to minimal. Usint two 1/8" layers, the lamination will spring when it comes off the mold. But if it can be force-fit then the stresses will soon ease as the wood fibers stretch into thier new home.

FWIW, Ive done two coamings off a form ala Joe Greenley except I used strip to build them. Youd think theyd match exactly, but I still had to sand a little of the opening to get them to fit. Also FWIW, Id suggest trying not to open the coaming any further than you have to, go too far and it gets hard to find a skirt to fit it.

: Well I am trying to build coamings for my double and ran into some
: difficulty.
: I cut 2 pieces of 1/8 inch by 2 inch wide cherry to laminate for each of the
: verticle part of the coamings. I found I had to soak the wood in order to
: make the bends needed (a Guillemot double). I then bent these around a
: form I made of the cockpit cutout. However when the wood dried and I
: attempted to fit one piece to the cockpit opening (before lamination) I
: found several areas it did not fit tightly - my form was not precise to
: the cockpit cutout. The force needed to make it fit seems unreasonable to
: me. I could redo the form to make it more accurate, resoak the wood and
: reclamp it to the form but now wondering if this is the best way to go
: about this job. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
: Thanks
: Joe