salt water stains

I took a look at a W/C canoe for a customer who thought the boat needed repair. It is in good shape and they should be able to get several more years out of it. However they want to use in salt water. I know that this can cause some halos around nails in the ribs, but how long will this take? One use or several years? And will this be eliminated if they rinse thouroughly with fresh after every use.

I don't have experience with this but --

Rinsing might get enough salt away from the clenched end of the nails/tacks that are visible on the interior of the canoe. However, I would guess that the salt water that gets into the canvas and on and into the wood on the exterior of the canoe, around the tack heads, would leave salt that is not likely to be much affected by rinsing out. I think it would be very hard to flush out salt water the gets between the wooden hull and the canvas cover.

Seems to me that the customer should be alerted to the fact that using the boat in salt water will set up a chemical reaction in the metal. It may be like getting a box of chocolates-- just one more [time in the water] won't hurt... and before long, your teeth have fallen out. Or something like that...

It is my unscientific opinion that the galvanic action of salt water(dezincification of the alloy of copper and zinc that forms brass) on brass canoe tacks takes many salt water immersions and many years to occur. The Client's canoe I recently finished had the worst case of "salt water disease" I had ever seen. It required retacking the entire canoe. But this canoe had been used in Long Island Sound by the client's father for many, many years. The very odd thing about this canoe is that there were less than a dozen halos on the clenched over tack ends on the interior yet the majority of the canoe tack heads were popping off. The tacks were almost all pure copper, the zinc had leached out towards the canvas side of planking and not the rib side. We have all seen those few ebay advertised canoes with white halos on almost every tack clinch on every rib making the interior look like a reverse dalmation! Well this canoe looked like that only with each tack head covered in white zinc residue.

I totally concur with Kathy's recommendation that the owner be advised not to use the canoe in salt water and if they do, to rinse with fresh water meticulously. Many years ago and before I knew better, I used to occasionally use my chestnut chum on brackish water and it has shown no effects of the salt water corrosion on any brass. Possibly the fact that fresh water being lighter than salt water was on the top surface of the water column and what I was mostly canoeing in in the brackish, tidal rivers.

A Boy Scout canoe

We paddle quite often in the ocean.
It's a real hoot to ride the break and even more fun to shoot through tidal pools.
It's so freakishly cool to see the details on the ocean bottom while you paddle.
It's also a bit disturbing when seals pop up right beside you.

But, we never use our W/C canoes for that (well, years ago an old Kennebeck but it was a bit of a beater).

We keep an OT Royalflex Penobscot out behind our shed that is used in the ocean and in the heavy spring rapids.
It's a canoe that the Boy Scouts are allowed to borrow.
Everyone should own a beater canoe to abuse.

You cannot wash salt water out of a canoe. Water gets between the canvas and the planking.

My motto has been:
"The best canoe for running rapids in is someone elses".
I guess that can be modified for ocean paddling.

Mine are in the salt a few times a year, I usually remember to rinse them out. It takes more than once or twice. That said, keep them out of the salt if they are for show.

"The very odd thing about this canoe is that there were less than a dozen halos on the clenched over tack ends on the interior yet the majority of the canoe tack heads were popping off."

Ed Moses' experience supports my concern about the impact of salt water that gets between the canvas cover and the wood hull. Once a canoe is well wet with salt water -- in my experience, a w/c canvas canoe picks up several pounds of water after a relatively short period of use -- I would think that rinsing the canoe would not remove the salt water that has got into that area, wetting and even soaking the canvas and wood. The salt would remain even when the canoe dries out, only to dissolve and become active when the canoe gets wet again -- even if the wetting is with fresh water. Salt does not evaporate -- it is left behind as a residue when salt water dries. I would worry that the process of corrosion, though perhaps slow, would continue for a very long time.

Perhaps multiple exposures are needed for there to be serious impacts, and perhaps I'm just a touch paranoid -- but I wouldn't take the chance. I think MGC's practice of using a non-wood canoe (whether a beater or a better boat) for salt water is quite wise.

Hello Greg,
I never take a wood and canvas canoe in salt water. I am even careful about going to close to the Gulf when paddling down rivers, as down here they all empty into salt water. We always use a Merrimac when there is a chance of salty water. They have wooden ribs and gelcoat with either carbon fiber or kevlar. Patty always says they go everywhere but the Assembly. I have had one for about ten years with no ill effect from the salt. Not the same as wood and canvas, but I am not risking a piece of history. Macky

I have had my wood and canvas/verolite/dacron covered canoes in and out of the salt for 30+ years; some of them are tacked with pure copper,and some with brass. It has yet to be a problem. The only rinsing is to get the obvious gravel and sand out, which is always a little less than 100% effective.

I suspect the 1930 OT Guide I plan to restore has never been on anything by salt water. It has primarily been paddled about the Basin, a large saltwater "lake"/hurricane hole connected to the New Meadows River by a narrow passage (called the Narrows). The New Meadows is an estuary of Casco Bay in Maine.

I can see some halos. You can see a full set of photos at https://picasaweb.google.com/115654...authkey=Gv1sRgCIOSqaP6_bev5wE&feat=directlink.

Paul

I just finished retacking a 1934 OT Yankee. It had been used in the Gulf of Mexico for years. Halos everywhere which, with stripping, are greatly reduced in appearance, but the tack heads were very suspect. After all the time it took to retack, it would have to be an exceptional canoe for me to purchase another one with saltwater damage.