Stich And Glue Construction

[Greg Maccarone]

Looking into building a 19 ft. center console for back bay and some light ocean fishing. I want to know how strong a stich and glue hull is. I have been doing some research and they seem fairly straight forward to build. Are traditional plank and frame stronger (much more coplicated to construct) or is the strength fairly equal? I would eventually Like to build my own 30' Offshore Center console if the Stich and Glue thing wooks out.

Can't really answer the question with a simple yea/ney. Both types depend on proper design and scantlings to work well. One thing that I'm pretty sure of though with a properly designed S&G boat of the same weight as a plank-on-frame boat is that the S&G boat will be stiffer and stronger and simpler to build.

I like S&G every time on any boat that it is applicable for.

Tom Lathrop.

[Bill the Cat]

1/4" or 3/8" core - with 12 ounce biax on either side (epoxy of course) - will be water proof and lighter than the equivalent strength plank. The ease of construction of S&G is a great selling point as well. Now as you consider designs - are you looking for sandwich composite construction or ply construction using S&G technique? Jacques Mertens' designs are the former, Devlin's are closer to the later - both offer a great product, but Mertens' will be lighter by far.