Canoe Ponderings by Red Rock Wilderness StoreCanoe Ponderings by Red Rock Wilderness Store
Canoe Flexibility
Q.Dear Sir: We were in Ely two weeks ago for canoeing. Since I have been back home, I have been looking at web-sites with kevlar canoes. I have found your site, and have checked it all over. I wish we would have found you while we were up there in Ely. You are talking about rigid foam in most kevlar canoes. What do you put in your kevlar canoes for support that stays flexible? Would there ever be a problem that they would break or break loose? We are over 400 miles away and do not know when we would be back in Ely. I would appreciate any answers you could give me in my search for a kevlar canoe. Sincerely, Leon
SR developed two key features that make their canoes able to flex on demand 3500 times and still hold up just fine. Heat-cured epoxy resin and their unique flexible rib system. Wenonah uses a rigid foam sheet shaped like a diamond in the bottom of the canoe. When you take tow 200 lb. guys and drive that canoe over a slightly submerged rock, you end up crushing a groove into that unforgiving stryofoam and even possibley cracking though the kevlar. If you don't seal up the crack, water gets in there and causes a spot where the foam pulls away from the kevlar which weakens it. Souris River on the other hand, full knowing the wilderness-rugged-condition-short-comings of Wenonahs and all other kevlar canoe brands (all use foam cores or similar principle construction), developed a canoe that can flex repeatedly over rocks without falling apart. They put a thin layer of fiberglass on the outside. Glass slides over rocks and protects the kevlar. Reg. plain old kevlar does not. It gets stuck and chews itself up on the rocks allowing it to wick up water and delaminiate from the foam and itself.
SR uses a special foam in the bottom of their canoes that can flex repeatedly. The only reason it can flex without falling apart is becasue of the epoxy resin. Other companies do not use epoxy because it is very difficult to work with when initially building a canoe. To put it all into perspective, Cirrus Aircraft out of Duluth MN has a waiting list for some 300+ aircraft which are made out of kevlar, fiberglass and carbon fiber. These planes cost about $375,000 each. The entire airplane is made out of heat-cured epoxy resin, not the inferior and substantially cheaper , vinylester resin that everybody else uses in canoes that WILL be slammed into rocks, folded in half backwards and chopped in half by trees. Souris River was using epoxy long before Cirrus Aircraft came around.
My final point: We sell 250-300 canoes per year and ship them all over the country. If we couldn't sell Souris Rivers, we'd be out of the canoe selling business because we don't feel that anything else is worth it.
Our number one hull by miles is the SR Quetico 17 in Le Tigre kevlar . Absolultely fantastic canoe on the water. 43 lbs., 1100 lb. payload, 1.5 inches of rocker. It feels like a Grumman from a stabilty standpoint but is about 30% faster on the water with 400 lbs. more payload cap. We have them in stock and will begin selling our used Q-17's on September 3rd. They'll be listed on our homepage at http://www.redrockstore.com.
Hope this info helps you out. Thanks and sorry you didn't find us when here earlier. We're out on the Fernberg Road just before Moose Lake and Lake One - right next to the Ojibway Lake Access.
Joe
Red Rock