High Capacity Great Auk Plans Arrive.

Well this past week I have been doing a lot of prep work in anticipation of the plans to arrive.
I have built the saw horses to put the string back on. I have built the strong back as the plans describe in Nicks book and I have started cutting up some old cedar 2X6 and some cedar 2X4 into strips and have them stacked on work tables on both sides of the boat stand.

The strong back measure out to be a hair less than 2X4, a full 1/16th of an inch on both sides just as I wanted.

I also took the time to make a router template to cut the center of the forms out so they are a true squared rectangle. I have also re-red the entire strip built kayak and boat book Nick has published along with numerous websites.

So far he most helpful website I have found is Blue Herron Kayaks, he is a kayak builder and has a support forum that appears to be pretty active. The forum has been running long enough there are tips, suggestions and tons of useful information on questions you might have in building a strip built, or plywood light water craft. Here is a link to his site. http://www.blueheronkayaks.com/kayak/index.html

The day did arrive that I saw the postman carry up the tube, it had my plans for the kayak in it. I was so excited. I opened up the package in anticipation. As I was unfolding the plans looking at all the form shapes etc, Bobbie Sue kept jumping on them in attack mode. (Bobbie is my Pixie Bob Cat) S I took them out to the shop before they got shredded. If you think that the plans will arrive with a nice how to book, don't get your hopes up, they arrive just like a baby. All there no book.. Heheheh.

I had already gone to the store and bought some 1/2 mahogany plywood to paste the blue print drawing to, so I could cut the forms out. I cut the form blue prints out with scissors and then used Elmer's spay glue on the paper and the plywood to paste the prints to the plywood.

From there I rough cut all the forms with the jig saw and then made all my final and accurate cuts on my band saw I got back several years ago. That has been a good band saw. I caught it on sale at lowes about 7 years ago.

The very last pic shows most of the forms stacked up. From there I drilled holes and made rough cuts of the center Strongback cut-out. I used my router table I built some years back and the oak form as a guide for the inside Strongback cut out. It is pictured in the last photo as well with the forms, its on the bottom right of the image.

I do have some videos of this process as well. I will post later when I get on my computer.