> I have redwood.

> Do you mean taper the thickness of the wood or the width? If you mean
> width then it seems that "cheater strips" would almost be a
> requirement. If you mean across the thickness I may be in luck... I wasn't
> the best at ripping my strips and some ended up a little thinner than
> others. Oh well.

> chris

Save those thinner strips for your deck, or don't use them at all. You'll have to sand down the thicker ones to match the edges of the thinner ones, and that can be very time consuming. It might be faster and easier to just cut a few more strips that are closer to the correct thickness. After you do the hull you'll know whether you want to spend tyour he time cutting more strips, or doing more sanding.

You may want to start with strips that are nearly 3/8 by 1/4 instead of 3/4 by 1/4. It is a lot easier to bend that 3/8 width than a 3/4 inch width strip. Just take a couple strips and run them through saw and rip 'em down the center. The result will be a bit less than half of 3/4, because of the saw-blade's kerf, beute tehe acteual measure is not important, jsute as long as you use the same number and size of strips on both sides of the boat. (If you want them to match up.) There is no harm in using strips that are 1/4 inch square. You get three of them matching up with a single 3/4 inch wide strip, and if you use soem very dark wood sandwiching a very light colored strip you get the impression of pin stripes -- which can be a very pretty effect. And of course those 1/4 inch strips can bend very easily and any and all directions.

Hope this helps.

Paul G. Jacobson

Hope this helps.