Paul, your posting on scarfing long pieces to strip leads me to counter a bit. First, let me say I have gleaned more from your postings than I think any other contributor on the board. I am not posting to disagree with you, I'm just thinking back to when I first started and I got the impression that long strips were a must. I had bought an old disassembled redwood sauna with 3/4" boards which were about 7' long. My experience stripping with these has been that it's really easy to butt joint in-line so long as you are careful to keep the joints spaced. My real point is, after I faired the hull I felt like a master carpenter! The plane brings these joints, which didn't look like much, into a real tight professional looking job. Add fiberglass and epoxy on top of this and you hardly notice that it isn't carved out of a log. While it's certainly more precise to scarf in advance I wouldn't discourage the beginner from just working in-line. I didn't really get going well until I stopped treating this bloody wood with so much respect! Get in and soldier on novice, there is forgiveness at hand with the plane and ROS! Keep up the good research, JJ.