: Assuming I
: "dovetail" the strips over the knife-edge stations, I note that
: most pictures show that builders run a flat strip (albeit forme in some
: way) arount the leading edges of stern & bow. How is that achieved?

Let us ignore that extra strip for a minute. When you strip the ends you bring a strip from one side around the tip of the bow station and cut it off at an angle so that the matching strip from the other side can fit over it snugly. That strip is then cut off at an angle so that the side of the strip is n contact with the cut edge of the first strip. Here is how to picture this:

Fold your hands in front of you. You have your fingers interlaced. Now take your right forefinger and bend it at the knuckle. You can now rest the tip of your left forefinger on the outside of the right knuckle. If your fingers had been strips, and you had cut the right strip at the end it would be shorter (just like your bent forefinger) and the left strip could go over the top of it ( jsut like you did with your left forefinger). Instead of doing one pair of strips at a time, alternating your starting side, you may want to do 2 or three pairs of strips at a time, starting on stripping on the left side of the boat. Cut those off and overlap with the strips on the right. For the next batch of 2 or three pairs of strips start on the right side of the boat. Cut them off and overlap with the strips from the left.

: Will I be planing a flat spot arount the stern & bow after stripping?

If you want to, you can. If you screwed up on cutting the ends of the strips, or the joints are ugly, this is a good way to salvage things, too. Plane, sand, saw, or whatever you must to get a reasonably flat edge and bend strips around that, covering all gaps. gaffes and goofs. You can add one or more narrower strips in front of this, then sand or plane away the stairstep edge to give yourself a nice tapered cutwater on the bow, or stern. If you are planning to add a rudder to the stern you can drill into this added material for any screws for mounting the rudder hardware. you cna use a hardwood for some added ding and dent resistance, but I personally think that is unnecessary. I fold my glass cloth over the ends and that doubled layer of glass cloth, covered by a strip of bias cut cloth, which bends smoothly over the ends, seems to be pretty darn strong.

: PS I saw Aricasilver web page posting and and was seriously impressed with
: the boat building skills - I sincerely hope you don't have to start with
: that skill level!!

You don't start with that level of skill, but you develop, and you come close to that level by about the middle of your first boat At that point you start thinking of the features you want to put in your next boat. By then you are hooked. Sorry, boatbuilding is addictive.

PGJ