Aluminum canoe.

Lightning. Hope you and your aluminum antenna LOVES big sparks.

Most serious paddlers have moved on to better materials. Enjoy your hot, loud, hard to carry, but will last forever boat. It's just not for me.

Tformex

Have a 17' Alumacraft LIGHT WEIGHT aluminum canoe that is fully set up for portaging. Same canoe that the US Park service uses in the Boundary Waters area when they have to go in to rescue people.

This is a model that isn't made anymore (even after Alumacraft went back in production), nor been made for a couple of decades, but is super light weight for an aluminum canoe, about 50#-55# which is nice when portaging over the unimproved trails in the wilderness, some of which can get quite long and hilly.

Got mine "used", but looked unused, from an outfitter in Ely Minnesota when was there for a trip into the Boundary Waters Canoe area. He had it totally rigged for portaging ... and he did a SWEET JOB at rigging it, the canoe is perfectly balanced when on one's shoulders and stays that way with no effort even when going up and down steep trails. Most balanced canoe I have ever portaged ... EVER.

Have looked around off and on for years for one of the light weight Alamucraft canoes with a square stern but alas haven't found one yet. The square stern on the Alumacraft is very small and the canoe profile at the waterline is good all the way to the back so you don't lose any efficiency with it compared to all other square sterns I have checked out over the years which lose their canoe profile at the back.

The Grummans are great canoes, durable as hell ... but I came to dislike portaging them because of their weight. 75#-85# is the norm depending upon how thick the aluminum is. That 30# difference between a Grumman and my Alumacraft makes a HUGE difference when you are doing a 1/2 mile or mile portage in rough terrain.

Canoeing friend has a very nice Kevlar canoe for his wildenerness trips. Definitely FASTER than mine on the water and SUPER LIGHT WEIGHT for portaging (their biggest benefit imo)

Problems with the Kevlar ones were 3 fold:

1) Compared to an Aluminum ones the Kevlar ones are VERY EASY to poke a hole in one if drop it when out in the wildneress (and you are going to drop your canoe at least once per trip, sometimes more). With the alumunim canoe it is HARD to poke a hole in one if you drop it and Duck Tape will cover any hole until you get home, even if it is a 3 day paddle ... Kevlar is very problematic to seal if you poke a hole in one when 3 or 4 days out.

2) After EVERY trip he needed to repair something on his Kevlar Canoe AND had to store it inside so the sun's rays wouldn't cause the material to deteriorate. Me? I threw it upside down in the back yard until next time, no repairs needed and could store it out in the weather.

3) Cost: He paid $3000+ for his very nice Kevlar canoe. Aluminum ones back then were about $300 used around here but I did pay the outfitter $550 for the portage rigged one I got from him.

All in all while the Kevlar is super light weight and paddles FASTER I would still go with the more durable aluminum one. I have seen enough people hurt and stranded when out canoeing in the wilderness that I want the durability of aluminum for safety reasons (if you ever do go into the deep wilderness take a sat phone with you ... great insurance, only had to use it once - for some other dummies which the Park Service then had to rescue)

Grumman Canoes are great.
Will last a life time.
I believe it was a Grumman flat back that Dick Preonneke had in Alaska.
No kevlar canoe would have lasted 30 years in the Alaska wilderness like that.

I do a 28 mile wilderness trip almost every year with my sons.

I have been doing this same trip for more than 40 years. I first took my boys when they were 5 and 8.

The best canoe I have found for that float is a 17' Coleman. I haven't had one for years, but I found one locally, with a golf ball size hole in it. I learned how to plastic weld and fixed it. It was as great as I remembered them from years ago.

They are an open floor pan and have a keel. My Old Town is cramped, with plastic cabinet storage in the middle. The storage is just too small to be of any use and it takes up valuable space. So the canoe feels cramped. It has no keel and spins out of control in current or wind. You end up fighting the canoe half way down the river.

The aluminum canoes snag on rocks, lurching you forward when they hang. I have a permanent scar on my left shin from being thrown into the support bar multiple times. The Coleman slides right over.

The coleman is light enough, stays on course better, and is essentially a cargo canoe. You can carry a lot of gear, and it is stable in rapids.

If you can plastic weld you can fix a hole for the price of a plastic bottle of Tide.

Arkansas....great rivers there for sure.

For a river, I think I might prefer an inflatable. For lakes, a solid canoe that is outfitted correctly can be a relaxing experience without breaking the bank to do it. With roof racks on a vehicle, and a canoe's portability, you can forgo using a trailer and incurring additional cost for transport.

Considering I predominately fish lakes, there is a good reason to us a canoe. In my state, there are no licensing or registration requirements for using a canoe 16' or less on lakes as opposed to the requirements for taking one on Federally regulated moving bodies of water. For boats, it is 14'.

Other states and jurisdictions may have different regulations.

As shown below for using a canoe in my state;

Registering your Vessel
Register your boat with the Washington State Department of Licensing. To navigate, operate, employ, or moor your vessel in Washington, you must have a Washington title, registration card, and registration decals, except when your vessel is:

a canoe, kayak, or not propelled by a motor or sail.
less than 16 feet in length and has a motor of 10 horsepower or less and is used on non-federal waters only.
properly registered by a resident of another state or country who uses Washington waters for 60 days or fewer. [link to boat.wa.gov (secure)]

8lb anchors are too heavy for a canoe. 3.5lb folding anchors are perfect and quite common. They also make 1.5lb anchors that work for smaller canoes/kayaks.

I used to have a cam lock anchor mount on the front of my canoe so I could raise and drop anchor without getting out of my seat. I will Never do that again.

One day while fishing a 9,500 acre lake it was calm all day and then the wind picked up and within minutes they were whitecaps. I grabbed the rope to raise anchor and head to shore but my anchor was caught on a fish crib and it would not budge.

I tried standing to move to the front of the canoe so I could cut the rope but that pushed the bow of the down and whitecaps were coming over the bow. There was no way to cut the anchor rope. I paddled as hard as I could straight into the wind/waves hoping it would free my anchor from the fish crib and I was lucky it worked. I never attached that anchor mount to the bow again after that.

Always make sure the rope is within reach so you can cut the rope if something crazy happens. And keep a knife on your person.

:knife: or cut an anchor line so you don't swim with the fish....

I disagree with 8lb being too heavy.

I have two 8lb mushroom anchors.

I use to have a 6lb one, but it wasn't enough to keep me from blowing across the lake. I just drug on the bottom and that is how I lost it, when it snagged. I was using para-cord as the line at the time and my knot slipped as I struggled to pull it free, or I would have had to cut it.

After that, I bought two 8lb anchors and they work as intended. They stay in place and hold my canoe stable. I have taken my canoe out on a heavily trafficked lake with jet skis and motor boats with big outboard engines. I don't recommend it unless you have experience navigating choppy water, which I do. Even then, I don't recommend it. You will constantly be battling to turn into the wake and the return from the wash up on shore, all hitting you from several directions at once.

Those are challenging moments.

A lot are posted on Facebook marketplace or Craigslist

Did you consider that mushroom anchors suck? The folding anchors I mentioned are like grappling hooks and they grab the lake bottom well. They are designed for canoes, and they sell them at canoe shops. A 3.5lb'er holds my 16' Penobscot quite well on a 9,500+ acre lake.

Lightening?

I prefer a mushroom anchor, especially in lakes with high silt content rather than rocks.

Taking into account an anchor can damage a canoe. Mushroom anchors don't have sharp edges, are coated in vinyl and are effective at preventing drift and add to stability when placed correctly.

I agree with the assessment in the following link.

Best Anchors for Canoe
June 2, 2022 by Jonathan Larson [link to www.ridetheducksofseattle.com (secure)]

If you prefer a mushroom anchor compared to the traditional fluked build, I recommend this product. It has a bowl-shaped head and welded shank optimized to do well in weed, mud, and silt. The anchor is connected to a 25-foot line, marine buoy, and a snap-on hook.

The eight-pound anchor is heavy enough to help easily stabilize my position. It works well not just for canoes, but even for inflatables and kayaks with a length of up to ten feet. It is surprisingly lightweight to carry easily while heavy enough to have the needed canoe anchor weight to prevent drifting. The anchor has a long-lasting vinyl coating, which protects against wear.

Ease of use is another reason why I included this product in my recommendations. The metal hook is easy to connect to any canoe. It is also effortless to clean and maintain. Best of all, it is a snap to retrieve!

Before buying this anchor, take note that it does not work well on rocky bottoms. Mushroom anchors are ideal in sandy and soft bottoms where the suction created by the head will allow the anchor to penetrate. Also, at 25 feet, the rope can be too short for some users. I recommend using this anchor only when you are in shallow waters. [link to www.ridetheducksofseattle.com (secure)]

You are more apt to be struck by a vehicle than you are lightening. So it's not really a concern. Just don't fish when the clouds say it's going to storm and you should be fine.

In prep for my canoe anchor mod, I Picked up a set of 4 CAMVATE Universal C-Clamps. I think I might get another set if they serve my purposes well enough.

I think these will allow me to easily accessorize my aluminum canoe without the need for drilling holes in it everywhere.

When transporting, I stow my canoe on top of a raised canopy affixed to my truck bed; it comes with tie down racks on top, so need accessories I can easily take on and off my canoe when shelving my canoe on the racks.

I plan on using these clamps, not only to clamp an anchor winch plate onto my gunnels, with affixed crank, using some ingenuity, but I also may be able to get it to double as a base for some paddle clips and/or eye bolts for anchor line, by using the pre drilled holes to affix the clips and eye bolt to.

I purchased an Attwood anchor system. I currently only have 1.

If I can mod this right, I should be able to make the whole unit into a single fixture to easily affix my anchor system to my canoe once I arrive at the lake, in a matter of minuets.

Ideally I would have an anchor system on both sides, one for fore and one for aft, to balance things properly.

Attaching the anchor housing portion of the unit on the stern and bow without drilling will be a bit tricky, but I think I have come up with a solution that will work.

There is a small hole that comes standard with these canoe's right at the tip of the canoe. I can use an L hook inserted into that drilled through a board, then clamp the board itself toward the interior, either on the gunnels or on the end shelf.

If I fabricate such a flat wood piece, I can insert a hook attachment to that board to hold it in place, using the small hole at the canoe ends. With my anchor housing bolted to that, would need some padding for extra support and to sit flush with the screw ends, so I would glue a sheet of rubber latex mat to the underside for grip and fitment purposes making it secure and tight when all bolted down.

[link to paddling.com (secure)]

How to Choose the Right Canoe
There are over one hundred canoe manufacturers out there, each with an endless assortment of canoe models, as well as their own private classification system. On top of all that, there's those opinionated canoeists that also go out of their way to tell you you've bought the wrong boat the moment you bring it home.

Quite honestly, purchasing a canoe can be more stressful than buying a car. But like buying a car, the perfect scenario would be to own a dozen models. And just as golfers choose the best club to get the ball to the green, a canoeist would choose the best boat for the water to be paddled each trip. Of course, acquiring a dozen or so canoes can be a little expensive, [moo at the web address, next to all this bullshit I just typed.] [link to paddling.com (secure)]

I did it!

I attached an easily removable on/off, solid, anchor system over the end points of my canoe without drilling any new holes in my canoe.



The gunnel rail on my Grumman Aluminum Canoe has a groove recess that runs the entire length under the gunnels on my canoe. This is what allowed me to do this.

I took some metal wall shelf, steel bracket rods and cut them down to manageable lengths to fit inside this groove. I found I needed to take a hacksaw and cut partway through in key spots to allow it to contour fit the up-swept taper of the gunnel grooves on the canoe for better fit. A few cut in the rod and it contoured much nicer.

Essentially, I turned the wall shelf bracket into a gunnel hook.

Single Slot 50mm pitch upright matte Black 995mm [link to shelvingshop.com.au (secure)]

I then took a small square wooden dowel and slightly shaved it down to fit alongside the Gunnel in the shelf bracket track and using small screws, screwed that into the shelf bracket that was left exposed, with the dowels on both sides of the canoe, meeting at the triangular shaped apex JUST PAST the canoe tip.

I ran a bolt with washers through that triangular apex that end together just past the canoe tip to later affix the Anchor lift.

Using a piece of cardboard I traced the canoe apex triangle.

I overlaid that on some plywood and then I cut a pattern from 1/8 sheet of plywood to fit the triangular canoe end and overlaid that onto the shelf bracket and dowels, then screwed this modified wooden top plate down to the dowel on each side on the canoe top side.

This became part of the clamping force holding it all together.

I cut and used two layer of free floating vinyl linoleum under the lower portion of the plywood sheet toward the canoe interior to take out slack when tightening the bolt and washer piece and protect the aluminum canoe surface from clamp force.

Near the canoe tip, I needed more clamping force to work in opposition of the bolt with the washers, so I cut and modified an (aluminum window screen rail or door screen housing piece) as a hold down bracket and screwed that under the plywood piece near the canoe point to hold the board the anchor lift is attached to in place so it doesn't swivel. It's just a small aluminum lip to catch that board and hold it in place.

I then cut a 1/4 inch board to use for the above and sawed a groove into it as a channel for the bolt and washers to sit in. I bolted the Atwood Anchor lift portion onto that and then slipped it under the bolt with the washers at the canoe apex and then placed the edge toward the canoe interior, under the aluminum lip of the modified aluminum door piece and tightened the bolt with the washers, clamping the entire thing down solid.

I now have a removable bracket affixed to my canoe that serves to hold the anchor lift over my canoe tip. The bracket uses a compression clamp system.

I can leave part of the system attached to the canoe and then when at the lake take 2-3 min to affix the anchor housing pieces.

Or I can remove the whole unit in less than 3 min and have the canoe in it's original form for paddling.

I will try to post pics later to go along with the description I just shared.

Now I need to affix the anchor crank to a plate system that I can easily mount and remove the same way also.

I already purchased some clamps to affix it with If I decide to attach to the canoe interior rather than on the plywood covered end caps.

I just need a solid, lightweight platform to mount the cranks to.

If I affix the cranks inside, I plan on backing that with some 2 inch foam insulation and/or vinyl to eradicate any cavity behind this plate and allow it to sit flush with the canoe hull, while cranking in order to reduce unwanted movement when doing so.

This is if I place the crank on the inside interior; each being on opposite side of the canoe interior for balance.

I may instead affix the cranks to the canoe ends, rather than inside the canoe to keep things in better balance and reduce weight, but I want to keep the weight center of gravity low, so may do a combination of such.

Still a work in progress on the crank portion, so have not decided yet. I may do each end different. One inside and one on top.

The whole point of doing this project is that when anchoring a canoe, you need to anchor over the end points, NOT over the sides.

Anchoring over the end points is the proper way to anchor a canoe.

While out on the lake, it's a real pain to anchor a canoe at the ends in the proper fashion without these accessories. It's an unstable procedure that invites trouble.

Without an anchor system, your rope gets tangled and knotted upon itself and it's difficult to drop anchor and untangle a rope at the same time, while maintaining stability.

Without these accessories, in order to affix the anchor properly, you need to literally lay prone on top of the canoe and reach your arms to the canoe tip and tie it off at the ends.

This causes a major capsize risk.

To pull up anchor free hand, takes the same risk and causes your anchor line to tangle.

With the canoe lift in place and the anchor crank, it takes all of this out of the equation.

You just turn the knob on the crank and it automatically drops the anchor for you in the correct position. No need to crawl all over the Canoe in dangerous ways to get it done!

Might not be good in a lightning storm

If Covid doesn't get me, a lightening bolt might. At least I will die doing something I enjoy..... right?

My chances of being struck by a vehicle are higher than being struck by lightening. Yet......I walk past moving vehicles all the time. Go figure.