C-Forum

In some previous posts, people have stated that the Royalex being used by Mad River and some other manufacturers is no longer up to snuff, thatit is thin and wears through easilly. Does anyone know if this is true for all manufacturers? What about the Royalite used in the Esquif Spark. Has anybodyon this board really abused a Spark enough to see how it would hold up? Or does the camo design make it tougher?

Hello, Royalex used in canoe mfg'ing is made by one company, Spartech. It can be custom ordered by thickness so they say. From what I've seen, its simply a matter of how thick its ordered by the manufacturer. It takes longer to heat thicker royalex, thus more expensive btu's and longer cycle times ( time to make a single boat). It costs by the pound so a tougher boat is also a more costly boat. Ive heard the phrase many times " the days of the old indistructable Blue Holes are gone" . I can tell you for a fact the plastic in old blue holes, older dagger canoes, older Mad River canoes is definately thicker . Personally i think its a profit margin thing than a plastic quality thing.

I have a Spark, but have only had it for a couple months. So naturally, it doesn't have very many LARGE scratches on it. Just lots of minor ones. I know someone else who has had one for just over a year, and although it has some serious gouges in it, it is not affecting the performance of the boat. It should be treated carefully though. It is NOT as strong as the full royalex made by some companies.

Now about the decreasing royalex quality: I know someone who has a MR Outrage made in '99. It has had so many scratches, that it's hard to beleive. However, it's still in great shape. It shows no signs of failing. However a local canoe club has another outrage made around '02-'03 and it has already started delaminating in two spots, which have been patched. I don't know whether that was from a flukey batch of royalex, or whether it is getting worse.

Just my 2cents


Nate

I've been wondering for a while, too, if the poor quality is simply the result of boat manufacturers cutting costs and ordering thinner sheets from Spartech. I've had access to a few Bell hulls recently, and they're very flexy and insubstantial feeling. Some are nearly new and have surprisingly many dents, scratches, etc.

on rocks and it is still going strong, although I have had to replace some of the plastic in a couple of spots where it cracked or delaminated. Thanks for the info. I hope Esquif and others will keep exploring other materials, not only Twintex but rotomolded linear plastic canoes. My Superfly is tough as nails and I love it.

Most companies actually order there sheets specd with certain thickness at high wear areas such as the ends of the canoe. The middle is generally thicker as well, however it is Royalex and inherently soft. Not all companies do this. If you want a stiffer boat get a conmposite-a lot easier to fix and paddles better. Thicker royalex is heavy. The cost of everything has gone way up since the begining of Royalex but the prices of the boats has not gone up at the same rate as to keep them affordable, not to mention the cost of shipping boats these days, so most likely the quality has gone down a bit. Again if you want a better perfroming boat get composite. The idea of Rotomolded canoes is OK for short freestyle canoes or "creek" boats, but for longer canoes it is impractical because of its weight and is impossible to fix if cracked and near impossible to get outfitting to stick to it. Dents and dings in Royalex is usually csmetic, if you don't do this damage to your boat the first time you use it I would be impressed.