Carving the Stems

 While scarfing the strips together, I was also working on carving the stems on the bow and stern. Carving with a spokeshave and a rasp, the stem which had been glued together needed to be carved so the cedar strips could be glued to it at the right angle. Thus, the angle became more severe as I moved down the stem because of the step raise of the mould stations. starting with a roughly 3˚ angle, and moved down to a more 10˚ angle near the stem-line. The angle was produced by taking a 8ft. Cedar piece and lining up along the mould stations, needed to lie flat on the stem in order to be in the right spot. This process was time consuming as the spokeshave blade continued to raise on one side or another making carving very hard. (I also had the opportunity to sharpen the blade with wet sandpaper.) After achieving the correct angle needed all the way down the stem, I then sanded it with an orbital sander to have a smooth surface, so the glue had more surface contact area.
Also, following the same process as before, I steamed six more white oak strips and formed them to the stem mould. However, it being cold in the garage, I tried to glue them together a day later but it was too cold to dry. Then, keeping the heater on from then on, I sanded the white glue off and reglued them together and I ended with much better results.