Hi, Glen-

Pecan is gorgeous, good luck. I've milled a bit of it; I agree it is heavy.

FWIW, I've used 5/32" strips, with hardwood. I've got no experience at all with 1/4" softwood, so I cannot compare, but the 5/32" hardwood strips behave nicely. Also, the 5/32" pecan will weigh about the same as 1/4" cedar, ballpark.

Others raised good points about width of strips. When rolling around the chine, if one doesn't reduce the strip width to 1/2" or less, there is not enough material to plane/sand.

I agree with Gerald that there are many ways to skin this cat. It seems that there is a complete spectrum in design philosophy. One extreme is that the core material (wood) provides little or no contibution to the structure of the yak, the other extreme is that the wood core provides a lot of structural contribution, and there is alot of room in the middle. The beauty thing is that all the methods seem to work.

My only major concern had been the adhesion of the epoxy and glass to the wood, since, as a rule,hardwoods do not glue as well as the softwoods. It has not been a problem, though, possibly due to the fact that it is not actually a problem, or possibly due to my anality in trying to make sure it did not become one. (I only sand the hull to 60 grit, deck to 80 grit, immediaitely after final sanding do seal coat with epoxy, the glass/fill). Knock on wood, even ash and locust (two not-great-gluing woods) have held up fine.

Have a blast! Good luck- Mike