: I see some other soon-to-be first time builders have the same dillema I do
: trying to decide whether to go with bead & cove or rolling bevel.

Hi, Randy, I agonized over this decision as well. I started my first
stripper a couple of months ago, and finally decided to build stapleless
with beveled strips. The conventional wisdom seemed to imply that B&C
was much faster and easier than beveling. Since I haven't used B&C,
I can't say which is faster or easier. All I can say is that you should
not be intimidated by bevelling your strips. I found it quite easy to do,
and after just about completing my hull, I can say that I found it quite
enjoyable as well.

I have done a fair amount of woodworking, so I used that experience to
develop a procedure for running the bevel:

1. Butt the strip to be beveled against the one to which it will be mated,

while also holding it tight to the station. Observe the amount of gap

that you see. This is the amount of wood that you need to remove from

the FAR side of the strip. I use a 3-level system: a little, medium,

or a lot. Of course, a many places will require no beveling at all.

I then mark the strip at the transitions between each of these 'amounts'

so I know where to make a 'small' bevel, and where to make a 'medium'

bevel. This takes about 1 - 2 minutes.
2. Place your strip in some kind of holder that will hold it with the

edge to be beveled towards the ceiling.
3. One thing you want to be sure of is that you don't remove any wood from

the face of the strip. To do this, I use a trick: Set up a strong

light that will be perpendicular to the strip (parallel to the edge you

will bevel) and on the opposite side of the strip from your body. If

you always bevel with the outside of the strip away from you, then you

will always bevel the near side of the strip, and the light will cast a

shadow on the newly-beveled edge. This allows you to see exactly how

much you have beveled and how close the bevel is to the outside edge.

Don't bevel right up to the far side of the strip, at least at first.
4. Run the bevel along the length of the strip. This takes 1 - 2 minutes.
5. Take the strip back to the boat and see how well it fits. Try rocking

the beveled edge against its mate to see if you have the angle just

right, and there are no gaps between the strips. Check that when the

bevel is flat against its mate, it is also flat to the nearest station.

Mark any places that need to be adjusted. Another minute or two.
6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 until it is perfect, or as good as you want.
7. I then go back and take a light pass with a block plane that is set

extremely fine to finish the bevel so the bevel and the outside edge

of the strip meet exactly at the edge. This takes about 30 seconds.

Usually, it takes only 2 or 3 minutes to complete the entire process; for
complicated strips, it only takes about 5 minutes. Using this method
my strips are all very tight. It gets easier and faster as you proceed.
I checked the fit with a shop light inside my hull a few days ago, and
found only several inches where light shone through, and that will be
easily filled.

I find this process to be very enjoyable and the final result far surpasses
what I expected when I started out. Of course, I am not concerned with
the absolute amount of time it takes to build my kayak, and I'm not in a
production shop, where I would probably use both B&C and staples.

Hope this helps.

- Jim