Ocoee disaster (the canoe not the river)

[Sandie_]

I have just spent all day driving to pick up my new ocoee.

what a waste of time and i have to do it all over again to take it back.

The twonk who glued the pedestel in got the glue wrong and the hull is all spongy. Am I right in thinking this is terminal for the canoe? The area is quite extensive.

Sad Sandie

[madmike]

It should be terminal fot the twonk.

[Sandie_]

A leason learned that should be shared: Be careful what you say!

"Come over and feel how soft my bottom is"

could be a little missleading

Sandie

[billcanoes]

LOL good post- how did you get a new Ocoee- is it a Bell?

[Tiggy]

happens when you outfit the boat and turn it upside down, vapors are able to pass through the hull.

[Sandie_]

Yes it is a Bell Ocoee.

Two photos of the canoe in our garden:
http://uk.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/sandie ... /my_photos

The rounded gunwales look odd at first but i quite like them.


A video of the soft bottom:
http://uk.geocities.com/sandie.wainwrig ... /Movie.wmv


Good news. The suppiler is doing his best to make good. The canoe was an ex-demo model, so its been used a little. (Anoyingly the largest scratches were aqired at an indoor swimming pool). Im getting a brand new red Ocoee as a replacement.

Sandie

[billcanoes]

I'll have to admit, youre statement about feeling a soft bottom reminded me of sophomore year and the anticipation of Henry Miller's "turn of the screw" -like your video both were dissappointing for the visions I had imagined.


None the less- that is a crazy soft bottom! I've seen where delamination cause the entire section to give, but it moved as a unit. Consequently- I would think this was too much adhesive melting the foam sandwich????????
What adhesive did they use- it looks like the boat is melted!

[Sandie_]

I don't know what glue he used. But I would expect it to be good stuff if used correctly. It's more likely to be caused by rushing the job and locking the fumes in.

When I glue bits to Royalex I use Vynabond or Evo-Stick. I have no Idea if either of these names exist outside the UK. I have only ever seen vynabond in canoe shops and is supposed to be the best. Evo stick is an impact adhesive from any hardware shop, I believe its what our glue sniffers like to get high on. Evo-Stick can be a bit messy if you need to change outfitting as the dirty brown rubbery glue is hard to get off the boat.

With both I let it dry for at least 20 minutes and then blast it with a hair dryer before joining the two sides.

I don't suppose the Royalex Bell use is any more susceptible to melting than any other Royalex.

Sandie

[sbroam]

Wow. That looked like the *outer* layer ABS melted, remarkable since the glue was presumably applied to the *inner* layer of vinyl....

I have heard, third hand I think, of a boat taken back to Mad River back in the day - back before mergers and aquisitions - because the hull had gone spongy. The compnay owner (John Berry?) said it was because the boat owner had allowed Vynabond to puddle on the hull and applied some their D-rings before the solvent had evaporated. It was spongy because the solvent had been allowed to eat it's way into the ABS and foam layers. He reportedly stuck a knife through it and told them it was their fault!

[Sandie_]

http://uk.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/sandie ... m=717d.jpg

[sbroam]

Also, while on the Nantahala in July we met a guy who used to manage Mad River's canoe production (can't remember his name...) until about a year ago. He said the quality of royalex coming from the supplier had really tanked. Maybe it changed hands and is no longer Uniroyal? At any rate, he said they'd send over a hundred sheets or so and tell them they had no idea what shape they would be in, just to let them know how many sheets were bad. In effect, Mad River was doing the supplier's QC... Not encouraging... I guess my next boat will be glass!

[Sandie_]

It looks like Uniroyal sold it to another company, Spartech.

http://www.spartech.com/plastics/markets/kayaks.html

Sandie

[jpm370]

this happened to my friends retrofitted Dagger Genesis....the boatshop installed the saddle/pedestal and the solvent from the glue passed into the ABS softening the bottom....unfotunately the only fix that they managed was to epoxy large felts across the bottom of his canoe, which effectively makes it as unattractive as a K-1 hehhehe, good to bell for realizing their mistake and replacing your boat

the ocoee is a dam fine hull design, i like to think that my savage skeeter shares many charactersitics with the ocoee

[Sandie_]

I know its anoying when people dredge up very old threads but I had to look for this one to see how old my ocoee is.

It's a month short of two years.

And its worn out, its sustained too many impacts and its delaminating all over the place. Its had it.

I hate what its made of and I hate how long its lasted but its simply the best boat I've ever had and I have to get another.

I'm told cutting the old one down to get some air is a fun thing to do, so I may try this.

I just hope my next one lasts a little longer.



Sandie

[ezwater]

I use Vynabond, like elmost everyone else, for glueing in D-ring patches.

Some people use contact cements to glue in saddles, and it should work, if one lets the cement dry THOROUGHLY before sticking things together.

But when I had to install a triple saddle, I realized that contact cement was risky for planting down three large contact patches. Instead I used 3M 2 part Structural Adhesive. It gave me plenty of time to work, and had no solvents that might attack the ABS under the vinyl.

I hope people will think about not using Vynabond and other solvent-containing glues for large jobs on Royalex.