: Thanks Wes and Sodbuster; your comments are much appreciated.

: I am playing with a method of eliminating the taped butt joints by
: using splines which of course make the surface a little
: smoother. I am using 1/16" plywood as the splines. I have a
: router table setup and am running tests right now to determine
: the relative strength of sample pieces, including the taped both
: sides, and one side varieties. I am comparing them against of
: "solid plywood" to see how well they fare. The splines
: certainly work well and the process is manageable with a jig I
: created. The setup takes about 1 minute to position the wood and
: about 30 secs to cut. The gluing (another area I am
: investigating) takes about 4 mins then the usual clamping of
: course. I am unlikely to start the building of my Pinguino till
: spring so I have the time to try some ideas on scrap material.

: I felt that as Wes says, the majority of the strength comes from
: the cloth sheathing on both sides, but wondered if I was missing
: something. I suspect the "tied together" nature of the
: whole structure (monocoque-like?) also helps.

: For those who feel I am being a masochist, you are probably right
: but the challenge was too tempting having read about Tom
: Jordin's Spline Joint on Ted Henry's web pages! I will share the
: results for those who are interested.

: Geoff

None of these methods are near as strong as a scarf that's awfully easy to do, hard to understand why the panels aren't just scarfed.

Bill H.