that's a good question.

i would say, based on my experience, beveling panel edges is more about the look/aestehtic you get at the end than really making a difference from a structural/engineering perspective.

if you bevel the edges, you have a clean outer joint so that when you do a bright finish, you don't expose the layers of the ply.  if you don't bevel, you either need to fill the the gap between the panels with woodflour/epoxy mix or round the edges over with enough sanding to eliminate the gap which will expose all the layers of the ply (note....if you do this, you must do your inner fillets before rounding the outside).   

it's got to be real frustrating to have beveled the wrong side....and i will admit....i know you are not the only person to ever make that mistake.  if you have the time and cash, i would make another piece.  if not, i think you can work with the pieces and use some wood flour to correct the mistake...and you just paint the hull when done.   

the most important thing is when you stitch the panels together is that you have a fare/true hull....if you have that, you can fix any gaps between panels that result from various imperfections that were introduced in the building process.

h

   I made the same mistake on the lower edger of the forward starboard lower panel on my Shearwater Double.  I decided to go ahead and use the panel anyways.  Most of the damaged arera was removed when I rounded over the bow and a little stain touch up made my mistake all but invisable.  

   I beveled a couple of the edges the wrong way on my Shearwater Sport and went back and beveled them again the other way (meaning that they became somewhat narrower than they should have been). My boat still stitched together well and came out looking perfect (to my eye). I think this is a quite forgiving process.

Thanks for the helpful tips. I have traced and cut out all the pieces. I am going to cut an extra piece to replace the one beveled on the wrong side. Another question I have is regarding the combing spacers. When I look at the layout for the parts in the manual for the Shearwater Sport, the combing spacers are not shown. Are they normally cut from Okoume? I see that the ones supplied with my kit seem to be cut from 8mm. I am planning the layout for the deck pieces using a second set of scarfed 4mm sheets and I want to make sure I have everything I need before I cut the deck, and replacement part.

Coaming spacers are typically cut from Okoume....and, as you mentioned, in the kit, they execute the spacer with two layers of 8 mm.   if you don't have 8 mm,  you can just double up (4 layers) of 4 mm of the same pattern.

i hope that i understood your question....

h

If you are doing an okoume lip, I would use okoume for the spacers.  If you are doing the sapelle lip standard on the Shearwaters, you may want to use sapelle for the spacers for apperance.  In the picture, both strip boats and the Double have sapelle spacers. 

   Thanks for the help. I guess my main point was that the layout in my instructions did  not account for the spacers. The materials list for the Shearwater Sport says that 3 full sheets will be enough. This is not enough material to allow for 8 spacers, as far as I can tell.

   Sandy, you are correct that it's not enough. I ordered an extra sheet of okoume in case of mistakes and ended up cutting the spacers from that. I stacked 4 layers to cut all spacers at the same time and have them come out the same.

I considered a number of different spacer options but having the extra plywood that ended up being the easiest. I wasn't crazy about the idea of the plywood edge look and even considered adding a veneer but then decided I was getting too obsesive and it turned out great.

I used all okoume amd my biggest mistake was using 4mm for everything. It wasn't until I was struggling to stitch together the deck that I realized my mistake :-)

   I wanted to make sure I was not missing something in the layout drawings. I have cut all the parts from 4MM Okoume as well. Did you manage to assemble the deck from 4MM? The material list does say 4MM Okoume is an option for the Deck, instead of 3MM Sapel.

   I had some trouble with stitching the deck ahead of the cockpit but it worked out OK. I'd probably read that you could use 4mm Okoume when I ordered the wood, but when I was struggling with the stitching I remembered the kit used 3mm and thought that was my problem. It could have also been inaccuracy in the cuts. 

It didn't fit in that area as well as I'd have liked and there's a couple of spots where I sanded throught the top layer of the deck plywood at the seam when rounding it off to the side panel. It's the kind of flaw that only I can see, but still bothers me.

I left the top natural and stained the hull a dark green. I don't have a way to share the pictures here but you can see it in the photo contest, leaning up on a log cabin.

https://www.clcboats.com/voting

if it bothers you, you could paint the hull a dark green.....and then you would not see the sanding problems you noted in remark above.

painting the hull a dark color with a bright deck can look really slick....and is a pretty popular approach.

that said, as most people will see your boat (from a little distance), it looks great.

h   

   You say you stained the Hull Dark Green, as apposed to painted? I'm curious about your method in staining the hull. The photo looks great.

   I used an aniline dye, dark forest green
https://www.toolsforworkingwood.com/store/item/LW-WCON.XX/W._D._Lockwood_Water_Based_Concentrated_Dye_Family?searchterm=forest%20green%20dy

I followed these directions (S&G is the second half of the article). 

https://www.guillemot-kayaks.com/guillemot/blog/nick/staining_your_kayak

I stained the pieces after cutting them out, before doing the scarf joints and gave them one coat of epoxy. After sanding and rounding off the chines you need to restain the areas where the stain has been removed. 

   Thanks  Too late for this Kayak. I will keep that in mind for my next Kayak .