: Having bought Nick's book, I changed my building goals from assembling a kit
: to doing a completely scratch build, including hand-lofting plans from the
: book data and ripping my own cedar strips. I now have my forms cut out,
: but I've noticed that the forms are not completely perfect. As with
: anything done by hand (especially for the first time) some curves are not
: perfectly symetrical left/right, on some cutouts I cut inside a line, etc.

: Errors are generally slight, but I want to make sure that slight form
: imperfections won't get magnified in the finished boat. So, my question is
: whether it's OK to have a fairly fair set of forms, whether I should re-do
: them with more attention to detail, or whether I should order machine-made
: forms to ensure a boat that won't suck.

: Thanks for any advice,

: Andy

My experience was such that while most of the striping went smoothly, there were instances with the twists and bends near the bow/stern when it was all I could do to have my strips meet the forms, and occasionally they wouldn't, yet I doubt there is anyway that anyone could ever detect that in the finished product.

Next time around the only thing I'd tackle differently would be to spend a bit more time dialing in and securing the bow/stern extensions. I nailed (no pun intended) my wife's boat, and it looks great for it. My boat has just the slightest hook at the point of the bow. I point it out to others, and they say they don't see it, but they're just being kind. It's there, and I see it ever time in in the boat. Fortunately, it just makes me chuckle, but I do wish I'd taken the time to get this dead-on.

I'll bet you're good w/ your forms as is. Take your time to plumb and right your fore & aft extensions. Best of luck and fun!

Todd