Got a chance to try the new canoes today. I’ll post my thoughts about the solo canoe today and the tandem tomorrow.
The solo boat is 30 inches wide 12 1/4 inches deep and 13’9” long, it weighs 30 pounds and it’s probably about as durable as a well-made Kevlar canoe.
14’9” is probably a better length for a solo canoe not because of speed or capacity but just to create a nice stable platform. Add a foot to that if you’re a really big person. The reason that I made this one 13’ 9” is because it’s often hard for people to find clear lumber over 14 feet and I wanted to see how a 14 foot canoe felt in case that’s all that someone was limited to. I’m also just a minimalist by nature and would rather not deal with the extra weight if I don’t need it. Handy boats get used more often.
This particular boat was built with a deliberately slack section in the bilge, because when I’m building for myself I’m always trying to find the edge of this or that shaping variable, to figure out what works and what doesn’t. It didn’t feel tippy to me but others might want more primary stability. The nice thing about my formula-based approach is that changing things like stability is just a matter of changing a few numbers.
Initially I set the seat 9 inches off the floor but changed it to 8 inches which felt right for this boat and was also a good height to use as a kneeling thwart.
In all my skin boats I protect the floor with therm-a-rest ridge rest pads which weigh nearly nothing, collect grit, and can be folded for extra kneeling comfort.
I can’t say much about the performance because I don’t have a lot of solo canoeing experience, but it seemed quick, not too tippy, and was well balanced between turning and tracking. I enjoyed being in it. I weigh 175lbs, a larger person would probably want to go longer or wider. Other than those basic observations, I’ll have to get a lot more variations of it the water in the hands of more serious canoeist before I can make any judgments.
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