Hi Chris,

I'll take a stab at answering some of your questions.

1. Strip cost: I purchased pre-milled strips for my first boat. I bought 90 strips of mostly 18' western red cedar (some 20') from Classic Boat Kits. With $125 shipping to Cleveland, Ohio, and a $25 shipping tube, the total cost was around $580 (1998 prices). When I bought redwood locally and cut and milled them myself, I probably paid less than $100. I had strips left over from both boats.

2. Lofting vs. Plans: I enjoyed lofting the forms from the offset tables in Nick's book. Maybe "enjoyed" is too strong. I didn't mind doing it once. It's really no big deal, it just takes a little time. It's part of the whole experience.

3. C&B vs. Square edge: I tried to use C&B wherever possible because planing the rolling bevel on square-edge strips was tedious to me. Probably because I'm not good at it. Some places you may be able to get away with simply butting square-edge strips, but you'd need to plane the bevel for most strips.

4. Sorry no help on Boston shopping.

5. Basement construction: It's what I do. Mostly, this is a quiet hobby. There is some noise when sanding, but that's about it. There can be lots of dust so use a vacuum attachment. Ventilate as much as possible when working with epoxy.

Hope that helps.

Ross