I have a harbor freight benchtop bandsaw with some quality band saw blades...Jigsaw's running some fine cut bosch blades...I'm pretty happy with the finish I get off those...

For a sander...I have the combo sander/disc sander - also from harborfreight, which works pretty well once I hook it up to the dust collector. For an orbital sander, I have the festool RO 150 - one of the few festool tools that actually make sense to me. The dust collection alone is worth the price of admission.

I have a Grizzly Wet Grinder - another one of the few tools I splurged on that turned out to be a good investment. The edges I get off this grindstone are spectacular all for 2 minutes of work. I've revived a lot of old rusty tools thanks to that grinder.

I don't plan on the stapling the strips...this is one of those weird things I want to go through just to see what all the fuss is about. If I do a second boat, common sense may trigger then and I'll staple but for this boat, I'm in it for the science :)

Thanks for confirming about the wood...just look at what came off the saw I said hell no ... the guy at home depot even commented on how it was a good idea I bought gloves along with the wood.

I'll stick to the furniture grade ply for forms just so those void filled wood panels aren't staring at me for the next 5 months.