; . . .outside of oak and
: pine from lowes i'm pretty clueless as to the best woods to use.
: I'm looking for a darker, redish tone wood for what i've labeled
: 'red cedar'. And something light for what's labeled 'white
: cedar' and something inbetween for the 'yellow cedar', but I
: think i'd like it to be closer to the 'red cedar' in darkness
: than the 'white'. The hull is made of okuome with a cherry stem.
: I'm not totally sold on the color choices i've made so i'm open
: to any and all suggestions you may have.

Keep it simple and you can make it look great without too many problems. First, see what you local Lowes has in stock. You are looking fo rthree wood colors, so go with what is in stock, or easily available.

For your dark red you might continue with cherry. That matches the stem, so it would pull the boat's color scheme together. A lot of cherry is stained to be as dark as mahogany, so there is anothr choice. Walnut would be dark, but not as red. Personally, I'd stick to cherry. It tends to darken a lot as it ages, so if your stock is a bit light--give it more light and some time.

Your white wood can be poplar, ash, birch, pine, fir, or maple. They are all very light woods and they all work easily. You should be able to find a few pieces of all of these species at Lowes. My first pick would be ash, because I bought a bunch cheap last year on sale. Poplar is frequently on sale. Watch out for boards with green or purple tinges. Those tend to go gray as they age. Birch is hard to find as boards, and so is basswood and boxwood, but if you can get some then use 'em.

For your yellows, you may find good boards in the same Pine, maple, fir and ash aisles. You may also find some red cedar sapwood which is orangish. My pick would be pine or maple. The winter rings on pine can be quite orange, so depending onhow much grain is showing, this can affect the apparent tint.

You won't need long lengths of your white wood. The darkest wood runs full length, so you'll want to scarf a few long strips. A simple way to do pinstriping is to glue a white strip to a dark one, and install that as one piece. Any trimming has to be done to the thicker dark piece so the pinstripe retains its width.

I suggest you first strip the entire deck in either pine or ash (clear pine is about as expensive as clear ash) then cut out the sections you want to do in other woods. The pieces you cut out can be used as templates for trimming the other woods. It might speed up fitting in all those small pieces.

You have some pieces making apparently severe bends. You may need to reduce those to 3/8" wide strips so they bend easier. Or, lay all the strips straight in line with the keel, and trim the ends to fit.

Hope this helps.

PGJ