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That would not be uncommon here on this date but instead I'm lounging on the deck with my dog and cat in 50 degree weather with no snow in site. I just looked up the top 10 warmest winters in Iowa and 5 of them were set since 2000, including the warmest ever, which was last year. The previous...

I'm very inexperienced with lining and have had mixed success. None of my hulls have a lot of rocker and most have less rocker in the stern. I normally put packs farther back to lighten the bow for lining upstream but a couple times ran into trouble when the bow got away from me and I couldn't...

I'll be impressed with Swift's toughness when they recreate this with one of their boats:

A paddle stroke that's too long with power being applied after the paddle is past the hip could exacerbate the problem as well. Many paddlers develop single side skills and only paddle on one side of the boat. If it's your left shoulder that hurts when pulling you could try turning into a...

Yes, that 2nd image you posted is what I was thinking of. Another one here: When I've build canoes with decks I ran the decks all the way to the stem and the inwale died into the deck.

Nothing wrong with that but normally the inwale would die into the stem of the boat and not continue to the exterior. The outwale would then be cut off just longer than the hull and rounded over. Alan

How did the inwales make it outside the hull? Is there a notch cut in the boat for them to pass through? Alan

Does your ZRE hurt your shoulder? If not I'd recommend using it for moving water as well. I've put many hundreds of miles on my ZRE paddles in shallow rivers. This includes paddling all out during training sessions and aggressively scraping the blade over shallow gravel beds when paddling...

Which shoulder hurts when you paddle? The top hand shoulder or the bottom hand shoulder? When I first began seriously canoe paddling I was using a paddle that was too long and I had poor technique (pushing forward forcefully with the top hand), both of which resulted in shoulder pain. In that...

I don't know. Just speculation. It certainly stinks a lot worse than epoxy and while I'm sure epoxy has its hazards as well I usually see people dealing with vinylester wearing more PPE than people working with epoxy. The catalyst for vinylester will supposedly make you go blind if you get it...

Is epoxy actually the outer surface? Aren't they using something to coat the epoxy for UV? I'm sure not all epoxies are created equal but I have no problem scratching my epoxy hulls. Alan

It seems I recall commercial builders saying that a 50/50 ratio of cloth to resin is ideal (I might not be right on those numbers) and that it's very difficult to achieve with hand layups but quite possible with vacuum bagging and infusion. If that's the case in a bare composite that hull...

I never kept track of how much epoxy it took when I was building my composite boats because it would have been too depressing. I'm sure the commercial builders using vacuum bagging, infusion, and much better technique use much less. I'd guess there is a huge cost savings with vinylester and...

Their Flowcast epoxy is listed as a 2:1 mix ratio and it's also quite thin. Thinner than the Raka resin I normally use. All their blurbs and literature (that I've seen) only mention pouring and they never mention laminations. I wonder if there's a reason it wouldn't work with cloth or if...

Can you explain, in a nutshell, what's different about casting epoxy? Alan

I've never lined with a harness but if I was serious about trying it with a solo I'd be tempted to install a couple webbing loops to the gunwale for attachment points. Alan

I remember looking into it quite a few years ago when I was building canoes all the time. Unfortunately I can't remember why I decided not to use it. Alan

Maybe, maybe not. There are members here from all over Canada and the US. It might me that someone knows a great location for a secluded 3 day trip that's only two hours away. Or maybe someone nearby has a canoe similar to one you're interested in that you could test paddle. Or maybe someone...

My first trip was on a somewhat remove river in northern Minnesota. It wasn't remote but I went early in the season and did not meet any other paddlers. It showed me that it was something I really enjoyed doing and I went looking for more. My next trip was in Woodland Caribou. I saw a handful...