: I finally did get my ribs bending right. I bought a couple of ash boards,
: made sure I got the grain orientation right, and it went really well.

: It's interesting what you said about the relative difficulty of building
: boats. This is my second kayak - the first was an S&G. It seems to me
: that the SOF is a lot easier. I had trouble getting the panels to line up,
: then there was all that wiring. And I really didn't like working with the
: fiberglass and epoxy. I never was happy with the appearance of my boat
: (although functionally it's great.) So far other than the temporary problems
: with bending ribs the SOF was been really easy and it's going a lot faster.
: Now that the ribs are done I feel like the end is in sight and I'll be
: paddling
: it soon.

: So I guess it's all in your point of view, and what kind of work you like
: doing.

: Chris
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my first was the Osprey double from a kit. as long as you followed the instructions everything went smoothly

the second was a Redfish Spring Run. Cut my own strips (that was a challenge because of warped boards)

didn't mind the fiberglass and epoxy work at all. Kept to the instructions and everything (knock on wood..) went smoothly. Happy with the appearance of both of my first two boats.

I think the issue with the SOF was that I knowinly complicated my life. Wanted to do Mortise and tenons which is harder than "peggin" the deck beams.

Probably the biggest complication was taking abit from each of the three books (Starr, Morris and Cunningham). Each is consistent within itself but when you mix and match then life gets interesting (eg the wedges on the gunnels from Starr, make the Cunningham mortise jig not work on the ends of the gunnels etc..., used the Morris approach of keelson first but used other Cunningham techniques for the ribs..). So you really have to understand what you are doing and then puzzle throught it. That is both more difficult and more satisfying at the same time. You end up really knowing what you are doing.