MacGregorSailors.com

Ok so we finally established that I have a 1971 Venture 24 I went to a mac/venture 24 group that has a lot of phots in their database and my boat is an exact match down to the pleather on the cover over the keel pivot point except for two details that concern me.

1. there a divider of some sort that seperates the quarter berth area from the aft storage bay. What is strange about this is that it does not appear to be an add on, if it is it was put in so well that one can not tell that it is an owner mod.

2. This is the one that really concerns the heck out of me. The stringers are really short compared to the ones found on similar years of the same model of vessel. below is a photo taken from that site that shows the starboard stringer.... that appears to be much taller than mine which are only about an inch or two tall. should I be concerned?

Ok I managed to get into the cabin today to snag a photo so people can see my stringers, maybe someone can help?





see how short they are? any thoughts?

Looks like they are also 2-3 times thicker. I wouldn't worry,

Sum

The boat is a 1971. 40 Years old.
Look for structal cracks along the stringers ..if you don't see any..be happy. If you do see breakthru cracks just sand with 36 grit ,wash with acitone and do a 6 inch layup of mat or rovin around the stringer base.
Chances are your boat is fine as in 1971 those boats were over built to far exceed todays Layup.
There was a oil crises back in 1972 that changed the Resin and layup. That resin was a cause of osmossis/blistering of hulls up to 1980's

Dave

Redemption wrote:Ok so we finally established that I have a 1971 Venture 24 I went to a mac/venture 24 group that has a lot of phots in their database and my boat is an exact match down to the pleather on the cover over the keel pivot point except for two details that concern me.

1. there a divider of some sort that seperates the quarter berth area from the aft storage bay. What is strange about this is that it does not appear to be an add on, if it is it was put in so well that one can not tell that it is an owner mod.

2. This is the one that really concerns the heck out of me. The stringers are really short compared to the ones found on similar years of the same model of vessel. below is a photo taken from that site that shows the starboard stringer.... that appears to be much taller than mine which are only about an inch or two tall. should I be concerned?

With the flatness of your bilge bottom, I would say that someone poured some sort of hardening slurry into it, perhaps for fixed ballast. That raised the bottom up, making the stringers look shorter. Just my $.02's worth.

~Rich

Based on the pics, it looks to me like yours are stringers (wood, I assume) that were put in and then the f/g was laid up over them to encapsulate them...many old boats used this design, with an internal structural "skeleton" of wood sandwiched between the layers of fiberglass. The biggest concern would only be that yours are still dry and structurally sound, not wet (from cracks or pinholes allowing water in) where they get soft and no longer provide support.

The first pic of the stringer (not in your boat) appears to be an external support trimmed to fit, set down on the hull, and then fiberglassed into position, but not fiberglassed over (not encapsulated). This would likely be the "newer" style if a change in construction procedures had been made at the factory. It was probably a less expensive way to install stringers for support, not having to make a whole layer of f/g layup over them.