Plastic and Fiberglass

[1905Gerrish]

Curious of members thoughts with more and more folks chiming in the forums lately about non wooden canoes and boats? This is a wooden canoe forum, right? What do we do about it? Does that discussion even belong on this page? Direct inquiries to a better fitting webpage for discussion? Just about all of us have these watercrafts and they function as our beater canoes. In my hundreds of posts here in the forums my plastic OT Tripper gets very rarely mentioned and certainly not researched. Being an all-inclusive club and generally non confrontational I am proposing at a minimum, that a category in the forums be added so these discussions take place in a more proper location and moved to the proper location if not. An example, I just saw in "Research and History" a Gazelle canoe! I guess I am a bit surprised that folks join a wooden canoe club and then inquire about non wooden canoes.

 

[Dan Lindberg]

I just ignore them.

 

[Benson Gray]

I guess I am a bit surprised that folks join a wooden canoe club and then inquire about non wooden canoes.

Agreed, and you raise a fair point. There is now a new forum at the link below for these discussions. I have moved the Gazelle thread there. Let me know if anyone has a list of other threads that they feel should be moved there. I've not spent a lot of time moving threads around in the past since it is fairly easy to ignore the ones that don't interest you as Dan mentioned. I've always felt that anyone who is asking questions about any old canoe is probably a good candidate for eventually paying to join the WCHA, even if their first inquiry isn't about a wooden canoe. Let me know if anyone has other ideas or suggestions. Thanks,

Benson

Canoes made from materials other than wood

This forum is for questions and discussions about canoes made from plastic, fiberglass, metal, and other non-wooden materials.

forums.wcha.org

 

[MGC]

My perspective is that the plastic folks have at least taken a first step. They own a canoe. They are canoeists.
They may become acquainted with the superior features of wood and canvas canoes, so I always embrace them as quasi kindred spirits who have not yet seen the light.
When I was coming up through, canoes were a very popular watercraft. You saw them everywhere. If I drove through the park (Adirondack Park) I would always see people with canoes on the roofs of their cars. Many of them were wood and canvas canoes. Gradually that changed. Canoes of any kind started to become less common. Canoe magazine disappeared. People who still used canoes were paddling pack canoes. Kayaks became the entry craft for paddlers. Paddle boards started to become popular.
Along the way, the wooden canoes I paddled became less and less common. I used to see a few on every trip I took. For the last 20 or so years I don't recall seeing another one in use.
Putting the rubber ducks in their own category does make sense, but writing the owners of them off as hopelessly misguided souls does not.

 

[SouthernKevlar]

I am new member of this forum. I have lurked, learned and gathered information here for years without joining. Why? It is because I did not have a wood canoe, only Royalex, Fiberglass, Kevlar and Carbon hulled canoes. Instead I joined and posted on a several other sites including Canoetripping.net and BWCA.com. I enjoy canoeing and enjoy the different handling, glide, maneuverability and the feel in the water of my various canoes.

I recently acquired my first wood canoe, apparently a Northland Canoe, which is a wood and fiberglass instead of a wood and canvas canoe. I am looking forward to the day that I find my first wood and canvas canoe, develop the skills and knowledge to repair, restore it and paddle it. It will be a learning experience and I know that I will be leaning heavily on the member of the WCHA when that time comes.

That said, I know that this is a forum for wood canoes, but I ask if we may do better to take those just starting on the path to canoeing and eventually guide them to the enjoyment of wood canoes as they progress. Not many in these modern times are lucky enough to be blessed with a traditional wood and canvas canoe; perhaps "just ignoring" them will only bring the demise of the traditional skills and craft that are becoming lost as time passes.

I have learned much by using this resource. Let us hope others may as well.

 

[chris pearson]

Wooden Canoes! Period.

 

[Dan Lindberg]

Of course there is already a section for strippers, which are basically a fiberglass canoe with a wood core.
And they have also been built without any wood for the core, ie, foam.

 

[Rob Stevens]

As a 25+ year member, I also joined before owning a wooden canoe.

Over the years, there has been discussion about whether we should open up the organization to a extend our definition of watercraft than just canoes (kayaks, rowboats/shells, ADK guide boats, dare I mention SUPs?) to embrace a broader range of paddlers (& rowers). This may help with member recruitment.

And the next step down this path might be to include watercraft made of materials other than wood.
Sacrilege! The sky is falling?
We already collaborate with the Freestyle folks who host "Adirondack Canoe Symposium" overlapping our Annual Assembly. Many of them paddle canoes made of a variety of materials. And many are members of both organizations.

 

[Andre Cloutier]

Your Northland is a wood/canvas constructed canoe, but Albert really took to fiberglass when in became popular and covered his boats in it, rather than traditional canvas. Easily undone if one wished to canvas and retain a more traditional aesthetic, but not necessary. Most debate on the merits of it will point to a longer lived canoe without the one sided encapsulation of the wood, but no matter. So there it is, you are right at home with your Northland.

 

[SouthernKevlar]

Hello Andre,
Thank you for your response. Today I wrote a letter to Albert Maw and included some photos of the canoe and the serial number in hopes of confirmation that this is one of his canoes, and if so to see if he has any of the Northland decals left. I look forward to his reply.

According to the serial number, the canoe was built in 1970. From the information I have found online, by that by this time Mr. Maw was building his canoes using fiberglass and polyester resin instead of canvas, though some sources point to Northland wood and canvas canoes up to the 1980's. It seems to have worked. The wood is holding up well and the fiberglass covering shows no delamination. The bolts and other ironware is showing a good bit of corrosion and I do plan on replacing the corroded parts. Not too bad for a canoe built 54 years ago even if it does seem to have spent most of it's life under cover. Since it has held up this well over 50 years, I do not think that I will change the original fiberglass material until it is necessary.

South Carolina is far from "canoe country"; one does not often run into wood and canvas canoes on a regular basis. When I come across a nice one at a decent price, I will probably add that one to the collection. I would love a wood and canvas solo canoe, so am keeping my eyes open!

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

Curious of members thoughts with more and more folks chiming in the forums lately about non wooden canoes and boats? . . . I guess I am a bit surprised that folks join a wooden canoe club and then inquire about non wooden canoes.

I may be a bit conflicted in responding to this because I'm a WCHA board member and a moderator here, but also the owner of CanoeTripping.net. Nonetheless, I do have a personal view—and, by the way, everything I say on this forum is just in my personal capacity unless I make it clearly obvious that I'm speaking a director or moderator.

The mission of the WCHA is: "preserving, studying, building, restoring, and using wooden and bark canoes, and to sharing information about canoeing heritage throughout the world." I think the forum is strongest if it sticks to that mission, although I understand there has been some small expansion into the world of other small wooden boats.

While many members here surely have experience with non-wooden canoes, I think a newbie who wants diverse info about plastic or composite canoes is usually best served by being referred to one of the other four or so internet sites that specialize mostly in those types of canoes. Similarly, on my site, although we do have a strong wood canoe forum, we often refer identification, build and repair questions to this site. In fact, many of my site's members are WCHA members and post both there and here.

As I do! To be honest, I consider every other canoe discussion site a competitor, but not this one. Because, as an old-timer who has loved all canoes all my life, I fully concur with the WCHA's focused mission and believe it deserves all the help, volunteers and dollars it can get.

 

[MGC]

The mission of the WCHA is: "preserving, studying, building, restoring, and using wooden and bark canoes, and to sharing information about canoeing heritage throughout the world." I think the forum is strongest if it sticks to that mission, although I understand there has been some small expansion into the world of other small wooden boats.

As I do! To be honest, I consider every other canoe discussion site a competitor, but not this one. Because, as an old-timer who has loved all canoes all my life, I fully concur with the WCHA's focused mission and believe it deserves all the help, volunteers and dollars it can get.

So....a couple things. First, WCHA is no longer the prime resource for information about wooden and wood and canvas canoes manufacturers. That is not a diminishment of the research that Benson conducts and shares here, or the ad hoc contributions other forum participants make. It's an observation based upon fact. The Wooden Canoe Museum is a more structured and complete resource for collectors of old canoes. This site no longer serves that purpose and has not for quite a while. We provide a discussion forum, but not detailed and structured content. The WCHA's solution to this has been to add a link to the Wooden Canoe Museum site.
Next, by virtue of our association with Old Town and the related Old Town research (also no longer easily accessible on this site), the path to WHCA is one that is easily followed by anyone who owns an Old Town canoe with an interest in either dating it or researching it. Benson has always very graciously responded to these inquiries and drawn from his vast resource of Old Town catalogues, the Old Town research and serialization information held by WCHA and beyond that, his own unique and exhaustive work cataloging and researching canoe related information. Given that one of the most common mistakes made is to misidentify all canoes as Old Towns, that results in quite a bit of traffic to this site for both Old Town and other canoes. Given that aside from contacting Old Town directly, there are no other sites offering detailed Old Town canoe dating or construction details, this site naturally receives that traffic and should, in my opinion, graciously respond to it as best possible.
Finally, among us there are many knowledgeable users of modern hulls who have no problem pointing people towards parts, repairs and information about these craft. I once maintained a fleet of Old Town fiberglass and Royalex canoes. I have owned, bought sold, repaired dozens of these. I currently own several modern canoes and I continue to buy, repair and sell them from time to time. I don't hold a great deal of love for these so you won't find me on other sites discussing differential shear or elliptical bottoms, but if you need help to find parts or fix one, I can get you there. I would never consider sending someone to another site to obtain information that I have on hand. I would stop to help you with a flat whatever you happen to be driving except possibly a jacked up Jeep.
Parse it as you may, canoes are canoes. There are (in my world view) no "competitors". Having said that, I have no love for RamX or Grumman.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

An interesting tangent, which I can move to a separate thread if necessary:

WCHA is no longer the prime resource for information about wooden and wood and canvas canoes manufacturers.

We provide a discussion forum, but not detailed and structured content. The WCHA's solution to this has been to add a link to the Wooden Canoe Museum site.

MGC, given that the informative Wooden Canoe Museum in fact exists, and given that it would redundant for the WCHA to duplicate that museum's content, and given that the part of the WCHA website we're now in is solely a discussion forum, do you (or anyone) have any specific ideas or suggestions as to how the WCHA could improve or enhance the detail and structure of our online informational content?

 

[Worth Gretter]

I have to say, in the year or so that I have been following the WCHA forums, my interest has been completely focused on the wealth of knowledge available here regarding wooden canoe restoration. I have previously restored two fiberglass canoes and one Kevlar canoe, but there really isn't much to discuss about them, in my opinion. When those posts pop up, I glance at them and then move on. But for wooden canoes, I need all the info I can get!

 

[Dan Lindberg]

Mike is correct - this site used to be a/the repository of old wooden canoe info, and which was one of the main reasons for coming here.
With the expansion of Dan's site, (it did exist before) and the (perceived) reduction of info here (can you still get canoe specs or catalog images here?) there are getting fewer and fewer reasons to come here.

 

[MGC]

Glenn, the ship has sailed. This site can no longer serve that purpose. The focus is not there. Consequently, I lean towards a more inclusive view of this community. I am absolutely an admitted wooden canoe snob and have been since about 1970. Even so and as I have already noted, I view folks as canoeists first, whatever the craft. I (and many others) am always ready to offer advice or assist in repairs whatever the hull. I would never consider sending someone "down the road" for information that I or others who regularly use this site can offer.
Several years ago, I drew attention to this sites change in direction. It was not well received. Read "where's the beef" if you have an interest.
The link to Dan's site was a pyric victory. I'm not interested in restarting that dialogue. The point then had been to create the awareness of the shift in focus. It was strongly defended.
I look at this site as a place to dialogue about wooden canoes. We do still offer some very useful assistance and information to folks who find their way here. That should continue. End of story.

 

[SouthernKevlar]

If someone came to your front door and asked you a question about a non-wooden canoe, would you help them to find a source for the answer or tell tell them to go away and don't come back? Civility should not be denied just because of anonymity or prejudice.

I fully agree that this is a forum for Wooden Canoes, as stated in the Forum's name, and should remain as such. There are other sites and forums that are more diverse and less specialized that may help answer their non-wooden boat questions with more skill. If we know of these sites, should we not politely say "You may have better information on XXX forum, that is more their specialty". This may help them currently while leaving a better disposition towards learning of wooden canoes in their future.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

This thread is now discussing two different topics, which is partially my fault. Let's just continue a bit more on the issue of the wooden canoe informational content topic, which I am interested in as a board member, albeit one who hasn't been around the WCHA or this forum nearly as long as many other members.

Mike is correct - this site used to be a/the repository of old wooden canoe info

Glenn, the ship has sailed. This site can no longer serve that purpose.

In board meeting discussions we often make a distinction between the Forum, where we are now, and the Website, which is everything else you see when you press the Home button (classifieds, builders, etc.). The Forum and Website are on different servers and are administered by different people.

Just to clarify, Dan and Mike, when you were talking about "this site" in your comments above, were you referring to the Forum structure and content or the Website structure and content, or both?

***********

As to the wholly separate topic of plastic and composite canoes, of course some folks here may be knowledgeable and expert about them, but I'm only suggesting that there may be a lot more such people on some other sites who will be available, often generating very long and detailed threads incorporating pictures and videos. See this recent example:

Royalex MR Explorer Cold Cracks - Advice & Repair

Hello everyone! My wife and I have been on the hunt for a used general purpose/tripping boat that we can abuse while we learn to run whitewater, and also use on small bony creeks. I came across this royalex Mad River Explorer and plan to take a look at it this weekend...

www.canoetripping.net

I believe it's a polite service to someone looking for advice to not only give your own advice if you have experience, but to also suggest to them that there is another forum that is more specialized on the subject, if that is the case. Let the person get as much advice and help from as many sources as possible.

There are also scores of canoe topics that may be of interest to all canoeists that have nothing to do with building or repairing. For example, someone might pop into a site to ask about canoe routes in British Columbia. While someone here or on my site, for example, may have experience with some of those routes, I certainly think they should share their experience. But I also think it's a helpful courtesy to suggest to the questioner that more thorough information can likely be found on the MYCCR (Canadian Canoe Routes) website. Similarly, there are websites that specialize in the BWCA, the Adirondacks, and the UK.

 

[Benson Gray]

Dan started collecting this information as the WCHA Knowledgebase at the link below which is still at the bottom of the WCHA’s forums list. The idea was that this could be user built and managed like Wikipedia. He imported a bunch of raw data, but most of it never got cleaned up or used very much.

Allow me to play the devil’s advocate here for a bit and ask why it matters where the information that Dan has collected is located? The internet makes it easy to link to other sites, and both of our sites are cross linked to each other. The important thing is that the information is available and I'm very grateful that Dan has been willing to take this on. There is a question about what will happen to Dan’s web site when he doesn’t want to run it any longer but that is for Dan to decide and will only involve the WCHA if Dan asks.

Most organizations like the WCHA will always have many great ideas that are beyond the time, money, people, and other resources available to implement them. The board of directors makes the difficult decisions about which projects can be supported by the organization and which ones aren't. We can't do everything.

Benson

WCHA Forums

Wooden Canoe Heritage Association Discussion Forums

forums.wcha.org

 

[Dan Lindberg]

Glenn,

I can't talk for Mike,
but as far as I am concerned, it's all one site, with the Forum just a piece of the WCHA site.
I had no idea that they are on different servers and admin'ed by different people.

And to be honest I don't really care about the "mechanics", other then it needs to be very easy, and only care about the content (usually hitorical things).
I will say that I gloss over most strings, only opening the few that I find interesting, either triggered by content or the person posting.

BTW - back when we were doing trips to the BWCA, I was a frequent visitor to sites like BWCA.com, CCR and a few others, but as I've aged and not able to go on trips, I very rarely visit those sites anymore.
I suspect this site is going down that same road.

Just to clarify, Dan and Mike, when you were talking about "this site" in your comments above, were you referring to the Forum structure and content or the Website structure and content, or both?