Here's how the stem on the stern turned out. I have the boat wetted down to raise the grain. Been sanding for days it seems. One more pass and I'll cover it with a layer of fiberglass. Went to pick up glass and epoxy at Raka in Fort Pierce on Friday. I'm using their 127/350 epoxy system, which seems to be one of the current favorite among Kayak builders.

More progress...Stern stem rough in.

I made a template from the plans for the finished shape and traced it to the side of the stem blank.


















I also traced the finished shape of the kayak onto the inside curve, while it was still clamped. I used these lines to cut the blank to width on my bandsaw. Here is one of the cuts in progress. The blank was intentionally made longer than needed. All of these cuts are stop cuts, so the fall off, doesn't...fall off.
























After three stop cuts, this is what the blank looked like.




















One last cut, and voila. 7 pieces. the one in the center is the rough blank.
























Here is how it looks against the template...close enough!




















And finally, epoxied onto the stern of the kayak, ready for the grinder.

It's been a slow summer with regard to this project. However, things are picking up. The heat (at least today) is merely stifling...a little easier to work in.

I fininshed blending in the external stem. I think it looks pretty cool as a knife edge, but most builders have commented that it won't be very durable. I might round it over a little before I glass it...or I might defy conventional wisdom...haven't decided yet.

And I've removed all (almost all) the staples and started to fair the hull

And here is the external stern stem blank. I laminated it the same as the bow. I plan on taking more pictures of the process for the stern now that I sorta know how I'm going to do it. The stems end up being really strong. I was surprised how stiff they were, even after wasting most of the blank.

At this point, I've glued up the blank, rough cut the shape on the bandsaw and with some hand tools, and glued it to the boat. I used an angle grinder to shape the stem further. I still need to bring the stem down to th level of the cedar.