C-Forum

Today was an interesting day. I met up with Tony B at the Lehigh River to trade my Nitro for a Pyranha Everest C-1. All was going well until Tony slipped on some ice during the shuttle and messed up his ankle bad enough to go to the hospital.

So out of five, three of us decided to go boating anyway. About a third of the way down the river we encountered fields of ice. We portaged one and finally decided to walk off the river after we portaged the second. Today was the first time I walked off a river.

Somehow, during one of these portages, I made a 1 inch by 1/4 inch gash in the stern of the Everest. I noticed the boat taking on water slowly.

So, all in all, if there is a bad day of paddling, today would be a good example...although we did make the best of it and told how it would be a good story.

So, how do I fix the boat? I thought plastic was supposed to be stronger than Royalex but I gotta say that I've never put a hole in a Royalex boat while paddling/portaging it and I've owned this C-1 for less than a day at this point. Advice?

Warranty it... Pyranha are usually pretty good with customer service.

Take pictures, contact them and find out what they're going to do about it?

well, the boat isn't new and I'm likely the third owner. Mot to mention that I want to fix this thing sometime tomorrow or the day after and I have a feeling that warranty stuff takes a while. I appreciate the response!

I have had good luck repairing polyethylene boats with West Systems G-flex epoxy and fiberglass.

You must pass the flame of a small propane torch over the poly to oxidize it before applying the epoxy.

If you have an actual hole, you will want to back it up with something inside the boat like duct tape, and fill in the void with epoxy thickened with silica gel. If it is more like a crack, round of the edges of the crack and fill it in with thickened epoxy. Either way, cover with at least one layer of fiberglass.

You can get G-flex repair kits with 4.5 oz of resin, 4.5 oz of hardener, silica powder, a couple small spatulas and a syringe for about $25. Might be enough to do the job.

Weld it if you want a permanent fix, and tape it in the mean time.

I was talking to the local shop and they told me that the last few years of Pyranha plastic has been softer than other PE boats. This seems to be by design as the boats seem to hold together better if you do something like implode the bow on a piton, but the downside is that the boats are more prone to bad gouging.

Kyle

take it to the AMISH dude for a good weld

How were you so unlucky. Did you drag it on the bike trail for a good distance or did you drop it on something sharp.

jatakasawa wrote:well, the boat isn't new and I'm likely the third owner. Mot to mention that I want to fix this thing sometime tomorrow or the day after and I have a feeling that warranty stuff takes a while. I appreciate the response!

Ah right, plastic weld is the way to go, welding a plate of plastic on is hard work and difficult to get right, but ultimately can be very effective.

Ed- I think it was from ramming it up onto shelves of ice and boofing off the other end. I was gentle with the boat..heck, it's the lightest boat I've carried so I just carried it everywhere. I think the ice may have been the culprit.


Wayne..I need the Amish dudes contact info. How can I get in touch with him? It's either that or I'm going to buy a welder tomorrow and will scrap some of the cockpit rim off for some matching plastic.

Wiggins- thanks for the 411 on Pyranha. I know zip about kayak hulls and boat designs. I basically researched this boat on youtube and traded my Nitro for it straight up. For the first hour of the run I was like, "C-1ing is PURE AWESOME!" Felt like a sports car. Really enjoyed how light and maneuverable it seemed compared to the Nitro beast.

Wiggins wrote:Weld it if you want a permanent fix, and tape it in the mean time.

I was talking to the local shop and they told me that the last few years of Pyranha plastic has been softer than other PE boats. This seems to be by design as the boats seem to hold together better if you do something like implode the bow on a piton, but the downside is that the boats are more prone to bad gouging.

Kyle

I've never heard that about Pyranha (though I have about Liquid Logic).
Though I have heard about some hulls that are/were unusually thin in places, and had a veiled admission that the design of the H2-zone and thus all the boats derived from it (H3, Burn, Everest, 2010 Burn) share certain heavily stressed points, which are unresolvable without a major redesign.

i just got one of these

http://www.urethanesupply.com/kcwelder.php

gonna give it a whirl tomorrow or tuesday. i'll let ya know how it goes...

Hey Golder, thats the same welder I used to put two halfs of a Ledge together into the Sledge... I liked it, worked well.

AMISH dude: Wayne Sensening-717-445-7031-let it ring-the phone is in the barn