The girth of the ship decreases toward the ends and so the width of plates must be decreased in these parts. To save making the plates too narrow at the ends of the ship, it is usual to run a number of pairs of adjacent strakes into one. This is done by means of a stealer plate. The end-plate of a strake of outside or inner-bottom plating which is dropped out as the girth of the vessel narrows toward the ends. It is place where 2 strakes merge into 1.

Stealer Plate: The first plate where two strakes of plates join into a single strake, near the bow or stern of a ship where the strakes converge.