And suddenly… it’s a boat! It’s a long way from lake-worthy, but it’s rigid and shaped right and looks like what it is. I’m going to let it sit mostly undisturbed until tomorrow, because the epoxy holding the seams really needs to be completely cured, and the pieces need to stay exactly where they are.…

That little fish-tail thing the stern is doing bugs me. It’s above any reasonable waterline, so it probably doesn’t actually matter. And in any event the skeg will control any yaw it might introduce (which means that if it does come into play, the combination will exact a drag penalty). It bugs me. It’s a…

Tightening the stitches worked wonders. Most gaps disappeared. The larger gaps at the bow and stern shrank, especially at the bow. Some judicious extra stitchery helped. I’m telling myself that thickened epoxy, aggressive sanding, and fiberglass can make all things right (the stern alignments concern me some, but I think nothing is so far out…

The stitching in “stitch and glue” is done (or all but done: the bulkheads are unstitched, but that’s 8-12 stitches to go, 4-6 per bulkhead). Adjusting the stitching, that’s yet to come, but drilling, squinting, threading copper wire through plywood is largely at an end. Considering the 3mm thickness of the side panels and the…

The tape to pull the side panels inward to help with stitching was an interesting notion, but it didn’t help. The trouble turned out to be that the bulkheads were simply too large. The directions say to trim or move them slightly if needed. I needed. I put the 20-inch spacer back in halfway from…