I’ve always been unsure of myself about the degree of precision necessary for carpentry projects. The design of my V3 skis is happening continuously during construction, resulting in innumerable decisions at every step. To top it off, not much is square, and the 3 mm plywood is a little like cloth and bends in unpredictable ways. I originally determined the shape of the outside piece by blocking the centers of the inside and outside pieces with a 9 inch wide spacer, bending the outside piece to touch the inside piece on both ends. I then marked and cut the shorter inside piece to length. The bottom piece was then placed underneath, and traced to fit. Things did not line up exactly during stitching though, and I found myself trimming the top and ends on the shorter inside.
I may have cut the shear clamps more accurately than necessary. I cut and sanded the ends to fit perfectly as the pictures show.
Achieving the fit you see on the left was relatively easy on one side with my orbital sander, however I had to clamp the pieces in place in order to determine the exact lengths on the other end. I’m not sure the additional strength is worth the extra work. We’ll see what I end up doing on the starboard ski.
In the end, I got the shear clamps glued. The Mas epoxy stipulates 3.5 days to be fully cured. In the mean time, I’m working on the port ski. When it gets time to build longer skis, I hope to have the design process greatly simplified.