Yo Tim

My first stripper is an expedition single, cove and bead. I have the hull and deck stripped and have just sanded back the hull ready for filling. I probably have done a similar job to what you have done. Up close there were a few gaps, knots, missing bits (didn't over strip the stem and stern enough and have a couple of little triangles to fill up). My joinery was a bit crap too and I have used a few slivers already.

However, Taking photos with my magic digital camera (seems to have rose tinted glasses because:) the imperfections don't show up, so that bodes well for the dookie schmooze cover-up being a possibility.

Planing and long board sanding got rid of the really coarse stuff. But I really made serious progress when I gave the hull a jolly good rogering with the orbital sander (80 grit - I had a pack of 80 grit discs handy). I even used the belt sander on a little 'bubbly bit' where the strips bulged out near the keelson (because I wasn't using the heat gun at that stage - doh!).

I figured I was not Nick, I had tried my best, this expedition was going to be a kayakers kayak and would only ever be see with some grinning madman (me )paddling it off into the distance so I am happy with things as they are.

Anyhow, I feel most of the gaps disappeared or improved with the sanding/ fairing. Having faired the hull, I know I don't have to use any more dookie schmooze than I need to. Because all the wood was equal: - untreated in anyway, sanding/fairing was easy and uniform. If you fill too much, I reckon you would end up with hard spots (dookie schmoozed) and soft spots (raw cedar) with a tendancy to troughs and hollows making your fairing difficult.

Once I was happy that my hull was fair (I may have a second grade stripping job, but at least I can justify Nicks Plans with a pretty true and close facimilie - Nick did say words to the effect that the kayak would look good in any media - including random coloured cedar strips with dookie schmooze in my case - didn't he?)I coated it all with epoxy (brushed).

The cunning plan of that is to harded up the wood a bit, give me an insight into its true colours and make dookie schmooze colour coordination more acurate plus when it comes time to sanding any dookie schmooze back, there will be no gouging out any adjacent, soft, un-epoxyied wood.

I think my expedition will be ok. I am sure your dinghy will be too.

Cheers Pete