Bead & Cove Strip Sizing

Thank you all for me to join the community and I apologize for newbie questions, as you can tell I'm excited for my kit to be delivered to begin the real work.  With that said, I ordered a full Chesapeake 17 kit however I've decided I'd like to create a hybrid by stripping the deck.  This will challenge me a bit but if everything goes correctly I can then push myself next time to strip a full kayak if I'm so inclined.  Alternatively, if it goes south I can still use the plywood deck that will be shipped in my kit.

I have a local source for red and yellow cedar I'm milling down to strips but have seen some conflicting advice both on this forum/website and from Nick Schade at Guillemot.  Universally everything I read is a 3/4" strip width.  For thickness however I've seen 3/16" to 1/4".  With those varying thicknesses it seems that a 1/4" bead and cove can be given to both.  The benefit to giving a larger radius on the thinner stock is that there's more allocation for strip rotation without the cove tip have to be planned down or broken off.  

Not having any firsthand knowledge on the matter my plan going forward (so please stop me if this is terrible) would be to split the difference and plane my strips down to about 7/32" while putting on a 1/4" bead and cove.  This should allow for some flexibility without sacrificing thickness of material.

​Jesse


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RE: Bead & Cove Strip Sizing

sounds reasonable to me.

i have built with both 1/4 inch thick and 3/16, and to the extent i have used bead and cove, i kept it at 1/4 inch.  it worked fine.  so i can't see a problem with spitting the difference to 7/32  and keeping the bead and cover at 1/4 inch.

i think you will find that, while it is great to be thoughtful on the pieces and how you are making them, the real action will be your stripping.

the good news from my pespective is that the chesapeake deck is pretty straighforward with respect to its shape so you will not have a lot of difficult turns or bends with your strip.  when you do, the thinner strips are much easier to work....but becuase they are thinner, you have to be much more attentive to alignment becuase you don't have the thickness to bail you out of misaligned strips

 

h  

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