: I'd be interested to hear if anyone has ever broken or had a catastrophic
: failure of a stripper or S&G boat?

Yes, they can break catastrophically, at least under extreme conditions (my experience is off the water). Let me pass on a tip/reminder I wish someone had passed on to me before I learned it the hard way: When transporting your boat, ALWAYS check the tie-down work of someone you're travelling with. A guy I was car pooling with left excess bow tie-down strap dangling underneath the car. When (its not if, but when) the car tire drives over such a dangling line, it exerts tremendous downward pull on the bow. In an instant, your boat will be toast. Don't believe me? Check the photo below. The boat rested on the car roof on a cradle, which provided a very nice fulcrum, right in the middle of the boat (Pygmy Osprey). I don't know if this had any effect, but the boat had bulkheads (very solid), and the cradle was smack in the middle of them. The rest of the boat is still solid as a rock, but the damage in the middle is pretty bad: all 8 hull strakes are sheared, split, or cracked, 3 of 4 deck strakes have minor damage, and the cockpit coaming is cracked on one side. I don't think it would have mattered if I hadn't had the bulkheads, but perhaps it might have.

Based on comments I've received from other kayakers in the area, this is a not uncommon problem to which ALL boats suffer major damage. I know of two fiberglass boats in my area to which this has happened, so this is not an indictment of wooden boats.

I'm still trying to decide whether to start from scratch or to rebuild this puppy. The deck and coaming are easily reparable. My current thinking is to replace up to 24" of every hull panel, one at a time to maintain the stresses and shapes in the hull as much as possible during repair. This will take lots of time, but hopefully less than building a new boat. Any thoughts from anyone with experience repairing S & G boats?

Bob