This 13’9” x 28.5” canoe (brown) is roughly the same dimension as the smallest canoe in my triple nesting set from last year (gold). I built this mostly just as a teaching tool to re-film the canoe building course on our website, but also as a “throwaway boat” so I could blast through a bunch of experiments before getting more serious about larger solo canoes this year.
The shape is symmetrical and it felt just a little bit slower than the asymmetrical canoe I built last year, although that could be because it also has a slightly flatter bottom shape, the variation in the wind, or my imagination. It’s more stable than I need it to be.
Being 3/4 of an inch shallower it weighs a pound and a half less and I actually really noticed that carrying it.
At 10 1/2 inches deep it gives me the option to mount a flat canoe seat below and above the gunwales, which is awesome because I no longer have to choose between the perfect kneeling thwart height and the perfect sitting height. If used in protected waterways I don’t see any downside in going this shallow. Because it’s symmetrical I glued a second set of mounting blocks forward so I can move the seat to that position for a convenient little table or a handhold when I sit on the floor sailing in high winds.
I put some little sheer blocks on top of the gunwales towards the end because I really liked how that looked on my re-curving stems. The effect isn’t as compelling on an angled stem but it gives me a bow geometry that allows me to use the same sail mast for a kayak as well. So in the future I will put this in the bow of these smaller Canoes but not in the Stern.
For me at 5’8” 165 lbs, 13’9” is a bit short for a dedicated solo single blade canoe, and at 28.5” wide x 10.5” deep it’s a bit bulky for me to sit on the bottom and use a kayak paddle in that position, but as a lightweight, toss it in the back of your truck and go fish for a few hours canoe, or as something you could use on a backpacking style canoe trip with long portages, it’s a decent little boat.
Out of space to type here, more details in tomorrow’s post, along with drone footage!
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