Sending Maverick to dog college

[Mason]

Another method I've used in fast solos for years, is just to sit in it first (sideways), then rotate your legs around.

 

[Guest]

The footpegs are extended all the way out and my legs & feet were falling asleep. And my knees were up against the gunwales getting awfully sore. My legs are really short so this setup is sort of surprising me right now... that there's not more room to extend my legs.

With a sit on the bottom pack-style canoe or kayak your legs should not be fully extended, but angled about 30 degrees at the knee. In any canoe where my knees touch the inwale I contact cement minicel “knee bumpers” below (or covering) the inwale.

I haven’t met a knee-friendly inwale yet, and some are worse than others, naked aluminum L inwales are especially uncomfortable. Depending on what part of your knees make contact even rounded wood or synthetic gunwales can be ouchy.

P5010762 by Mike McCrea, on Flickr

OK, I pad everything. I like some split foam pipe insulation on the foot brace and some minicel padding where my heels rest on the floor. Sounds pretty wimpy, but without some padding my heels start to hurt, especially when I am paddling barefoot.

The knee bumpers also give me the opportunity to reduce the width between the inwales to a more comfortable leg spread. In something like a 34” wide soloized tandem that distance is wayyy to wide to brace my knees without some depth of minicel.

With my endomorph physique a spread of 22” to 24” works well with most bench seat canoes. For pack-style sit on the bottom and the decked canoes that comfy spread is a few inches less.

These are massive, and need not have been that long, and I wish I had used grey instead of white minicel, but good lord they are comfortable. My knees and calves fit perfectly in the shaped curves, and if need be I can hook my thighs under the bumpers.

P2160532 by Mike McCrea, on Flickr

I know the Rapidfire is a beautiful new boat, and minicel isn’t all that attractive to look at, but a couple pieces of minicel that stick out just an inch beyond the inwales helps a lot. You could cut some 2” thick rectangles of minicel and temporarily tape them in place to see if that helps. It will.

But the Next seat & foot pegs in the Pack would make me pretty happy, I think.

On the OT Pack I would go with a foot brace bar instead of pegs on the side. The Wenonah adjustable foot brace specifically. I had one in my OT Pack and have one in each of our open canoes; sometimes (often) I do not want my feet spread out to pegs on the sidewalls.

https://www.wenonah.com/Items.aspx?id=29

I’m not sure on the Next seat, never sat in one, no idea how comfortable I would find it. Not sure if they are even “sold separately”, or how pricey, or how heavy. If you find out I’d be curious.

For the OT Pack maybe an Ed’s Canoe wide contour bench seat with some butt padding and a back band.

P1220459 by Mike McCrea, on Flickr

https://www.edscanoe.com/40cecacose.html

 

[Magnus919]

I’ll have to get a photo next time it’s out. My edscanoe invoice describes the seat in my Pack currently as “Old Town Style oldtostrese 1 51.00 Wood type = Ash Webbed Old Town
Replacement Seats Style Contour”. I might add a lowering kit to this setup, as it’s done nicely for me to lower the seats in the OT Camper. Butt padding & back band would indeed also be helpful.

 

[Waterspyder]

I've had my RF for a number of years and an estimate would be 500+ entries and exits. I'm not young or flexible and have only been in the water twice. Once when I was rushing to get in while trying to do multiple ponds in an effort to paddle as many different bodies of water as I could in a day that equaled stupidity on my part getting in. Second time was when my left foot got caught under a root while trying to get in = left leg up to knee going in the water. It's been over hundreds of beaver dams, crashed into alders on the Hatch Brook in the Adirondacks and carried camping gear along with bundles of firewood on camping trips across lakes with white caps. It may be my kayaking background but I find the RF to be very stable. I use the "out rigger" method of getting in and out while parallel to the shore to stabilize the boat.
As for the OT pack I have one of those too that I use for river cleanups and I've lowered the seat an inch or two and while it's fine for it's purpose it's not very fast and I'm not as comfortable in it in rough water as I am in the RF.

 

[Guest]

I’ll have to get a photo next time it’s out. My edscanoe invoice describes the seat in my Pack currently as “Old Town Style oldtostrese 1 51.00 Wood type = Ash Webbed Old Town Replacement Seats Style Contour”. I might add a lowering kit to this setup, as it’s done nicely for me to lower the seats in the OT Camper. Butt padding & back band would indeed also be helpful.

Magnus, Ed’s Canoe makes, and for simplicity sake lists as options, seats and parts for Old Town, Mad River and Bell, with OEM specific replacement shapes and sizing, seats and thwarts and drops, but will make any of their seats to specific hardware/hole spacing. Truss hangers too IIRC, with a small upcharge. Lowering a hung seat, even an inch, can make a huge difference.

Having some oppositional force, braced in place against a back band augmented with a foot brace is likewise helpful, more so using a double blade. But you don’t have much lower you could go with the RapidFire seat before you are sitting wet butt in a bilge puddle.

(BTW, if you stick a short piece of hose of the bilge pump’s exhaust nozzle it is even more effective with open boats; everything pumped goes neatly over the side)

I've had my RF for a number of years and an estimate would be 500+ entries and exits. I'm not young or flexible and have only been in the water twice.
It may be my kayaking background but I find the RF to be very stable. I use the "out rigger" method of getting in and out while parallel to the shore to stabilize the boat.

I feel some responsibility, as someone who repeatedly sang the praises of the RapidFire. There are only two boats I regret not having kept, and the RapidFire is one. I am a big headed, big shouldered, top heavy, not very limber and kinda sloppy balanced paddler, and I loved how that hull paddled.

I don’t much like doing the outrigger brace with an expensive carbon double blade unless absolutely necessary. There are other ways; a stout wood single blade, wedged in the water against the offside gunwale as an entry/exit assist balance support cane to help hold yourself more stable works wonders. Better than trying to arm brace off the bottom with wet sleeves.

Or a 5 to 6 foot closet rod pole, used as a stabilizing staff or entry/exit outrigger. A length of Home Depot closet rod also works as a push pole/hiking staff/spare tarp pole and etc. I’d much rather stress and scratch a length of $20 wood closet rod than a $300 carbon double blade.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Weaber-6-ft-Oak-Closet-Pole-65429/300722709

Stick an plumbing end cap with spike on one end if you like, and a dowel tee grip on the other end, and you have a multi-functional stick. The tee grip (or duck’s bill head) is really handy for grabbing things out of reach, in the boat or on land.

PC261477 by Mike McCrea, on Flickr

I hope you find a way to love the RapidFire, especially if your principal difficulties are getting in and out (mine too).

Or not; if no one comes to love the RapidFire I’m pretty keen on that canoe, and would entertain some interesting two-for-one equal value trades.

Were I you my biggest fear would be that the missus try it, like it and leave me barge paddling in her wake.

 

[Magnus919]

I've had my RF for a number of years and an estimate would be 500+ entries and exits. I'm not young or flexible and have only been in the water twice. Once when I was rushing to get in while trying to do multiple ponds in an effort to paddle as many different bodies of water as I could in a day that equaled stupidity on my part getting in. Second time was when my left foot got caught under a root while trying to get in = left leg up to knee going in the water. It's been over hundreds of beaver dams, crashed into alders on the Hatch Brook in the Adirondacks and carried camping gear along with bundles of firewood on camping trips across lakes with white caps. It may be my kayaking background but I find the RF to be very stable. I use the "out rigger" method of getting in and out while parallel to the shore to stabilize the boat.

I'm happy you've had a very different experience. I'm guessing you're nowhere as top heavy in that boat as I am.