theluckyone17

May it never be tested further! I may have to install airbags if she stops any quicker. I will say that my Sea Rider got sliced open while it was sitting in the yard. Maybe an errant lawnmower, or an irritated in-law, but whatever cut it was sharp. Couldn't rip the hole any further with my bare hands. Just sewed it shut, slapped a coat of PL over it, then Rustoleum. If you're looking for it, it's pretty obvious, but it's held up for the season. Just a beauty mark Never did find out what cut it...

Just west of the Rexford Bridge. There's a number of small "islands" that are allegedly part of the old tow path for the really old canal system. We were upriver from one of them by a few hundred feet.

After paddling SoF's for a few years, I finally got a real world test of durability. My neighbor and I went out on the Mohawk River earlier this summer. Water levels were reasonable, but the depths vary quite a bit across the water. Rumor has that the canal system has flooded what used to be sections of the original Erie canal, with the towpaths beside it... so there's some sections that are deep. Go a few feet over, and the water gets shallow, real quick. There's some good sized boulders in there, too. Y'all can see where I'm going with this, can't you? The neighbor is the competitive type. She's 100% Italian, and I tend towards the Irish side of the family. Anything the one of us can do, the other's gotta do better. She took the wife's 13' Sea Bee out, and I took my 17' Sea Rider. It's been years since my neighbor paddled, but she got into it pretty good... and inevitably, time came for "Hey, how fast can you go in that thing?" I'd set the pace, and she'd keep up... push it a bit further... she'd keep up... wash, rinse, repeat. Eventually she started falling behind, but not by much. We kept it up a bit, 'til all I heard behind me was a bunch of words that would turn a sailor blue. I glanced over my shoulder, and couldn't see her. Worried about her capsizing (she had a PFD on), I edged and turned quickly... to see her sitting in the middle of the river, at a dead stop. Apparently there were a set of boulders just under the water, and she hit between two of them as we were racing. I had to get behind and lift the stern up and off. Left behind some yellow Rustoleum on the rocks, and what you don't see in the photo is the rock 4 foot away with blue paint/plastic. Apparently we're not the only ones to have "found" these waterborne hazards. My neighbor was convinced she'd sunk the boat. Obviously she swapped paint a bit, but the fabric held without a drop of water penetrating. Scraped a layer of paint off, and maybe knocked a chip an 1/8" square in one spot. I'm very satisfied with how well it held up. The fabric is Jeff's polyester... been a few years since I built it, so I can't remember if it's the economy 6 ounce or the regular 8. I tried Dave Gentry's method of squeegeeing a thin coating of PL Premium over the entire hull, then a couple coats of Rustoleum paint until the color looks good and any pin holes are sealed. I'm happy with the results of the real world test. Link to the album and high resolution images at PostImage: https://postimg.org/gallery/g07wenly/