If you cut your scarfs so that they match nicely, and did a good job of epoxying them together (not too much squeezed out, coated evenly, no bubbles, epoxy right ratio and mixed well) then your scarfs should be as strong as the plywood next to them. When I built my S&G, I broke the scraps with scarfs in them (1.5" wide strips) and the strips broke in the plywood area--not at the scarf.

If you're worried about the strength, then put an extra layer of fiberglass over the joint. Pygmy does that with their butt joints, and the lined-up joints actually look nice. (and with just 1 extra layer of glass, will be much stronger than the rest of the hull)

Shawn

> O.K. so I'm scarf jointing two plywood boards together. I cut the side
> panels from that; do a second two boards and cut the hull (yeah I'm making
> a three-board outrigger). Now these scarf joints on each piece line up
> real nicely right smack in the middle of the boat; their perpendicular to
> the longitudinal axis. I call this a break-point. I also call that bad.
> Will epoxy resin and fiberglassing be enough to hold this boat together in
> surf? Should these joints be offset like a bricks or a wooden floor?