Impressions of the Freedom 17" build in the last winter

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Chris
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Joined: Sat Nov 06, 2004 4:32 pm
Location: NorthWest Germany
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Impressions of the Freedom 17" build in the last winter

Post by Chris »

Hello Folks,

after a long time of abstinence I´m back home. I had a year of and after building my first boat - with the great help of this forum - I was on travel with my wife and the two children.

We spend about three and a half months in Sweden and Norway this summer and autumn and had some good time on the water with "Silent ripple".

All in all I`m very happy with the canoe. It looks pretty and in many cases people liked to talk to me about it. When it lays on the roof of our car from time to time people came, looked around and than they were gently touching the hull with a smile on their face :wink - nice to look at!

I do not know where to start, so I will simply try to tell you some impression I have about the boat:

1. It´s light - whow:!. Our other boat is a 16" Mad River Duck Hunter, a really rock solid, but very heavy Royalex boat. Anytime I had to carry the canoe, it was a real pain to walk more than a few hundret meters.

The Freedom 17" is more the 10 kg less, so it`s really possible to carry it to thoose nice loney lakes in the scandinaviean backcountry to hear the voice of the arctic loon :big grin

2. It`s stiff: When paddling the royalex canoe I have the impression that I need half of my power to change the form of the boat, which results in a slow speed. The Freedom is much faster and I need less power to paddle it, it is also much more Fun to paddle.

3. Driving with a "Power paddle" : I build a simply motor bracket to attach a Minkota Endura 30 electro outboarder. While paddling without any outboarder most of the time I thought to use it for fishing or wildlifewatching/ photographing when I´m alone in the boat. This works not nice. Because of the hull shape, it is nearly impossible to stear the boat " round the corner", when I´m sitting on the back seat. Packing some heavy luggage near the bow makes the situation better, but specially with heavier wind, it´s really hard work . With my little son (nearly 6 years old) in front, the boat was even to light in this case. You`ll get a bad trim with a big Dad and a heavy Gelbatterie in the back... Here the Duckhunter (a prospector type shape) works much better.

4. Hitting the rocks: After doing some nice daytripping in southern and northern sweden, we startet a one week trip on the beautiful Klarälven in southern-mid sweden. The boat was packed with two adults, outfitted with a Mosekosel Katan Ten(Teepee), two children and all the stuff you need to stay with the hole family out for a few days. I was my birthday and after a few kilometers on a fast stream we reached a whitewater area with THIS ONE LITTLE ROCK and the big tree lying across the river in a really small rectangular curve -you know.... :embarassed

I jumped in the water but we hit a small (but very solid..) rock with the bilgecurve near the center of the boat. Not a very nice sound - and got a crack through wood an d laminates - but we recognized it in the evening when turning the boat around. A strip of ducktape worked for the rest of the week. Now it did some repair, everything is working fine but I got this mark to talk about "do you remember my birthday on Sweden....."

For the high impact of the crash the damage was not to big, but paddling on stony waters is maybe not ever a pleasure in a Cedar Stripper. The other thing I recognized was, that the 17" Freedom could be a little bigger for the hole family. I know that there is a 17`9" footer, but our combination of a small-midsized car and a small caravan we used for travelling around in scandinavia limited the size of boat in it`s lenght - so if you have the place on the car´s roof, it`s maybe a good idea to build the longer one.

5. Stability
I love the canoe very much as I pointed out above, but with small children I would probably choose another hull shape. The benefits of the asymetrical design have some drawbacks in stability. To be concret: Behind my son, now 6 years old, we have a pretty little girl, who behaves in the boat like a sqirrel: she likes to sit in front of my wife and change from one side to the other in seconds. My son does the same thinks a little bit slower between my wife and me.... That´s all not a big deal in our prospector style duckhunter, but in the Freedom the widest part of the hull is exaxly were he plays, and in the front the only 15 kilogramms of my full outfitted little girl makes a REAL difference in trim when jumping from on side to the other...
We did never capsized because of it, but with the experience of this summer, I would maybe build another boat for this special reason. But: The children are growing fast, so I´m thinking about building a Bob´s special when they are old enough to paddle on thier own - and isn`t a Bob`s a nice Solocanoe???

The building of the Freedom 17" gave me much of joy , fun and experience and ýou all know that it is a wonderful thing to paddle a selfmade canoe in the wilderness. So I had to start my next boat - I started this week in building a Optimist dinghy for my son - should be ready in a few less working hours than "silent ripple".

It would be a pleasure for me to share some paddling photos from last summer with you, you are welcome to use the link on the bottom.

Best regards to all of you!

Chris

http://www.natur-im-sucher.com/schweden_2005/index.html
Last edited by Chris on Thu Nov 10, 2005 4:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Glen Smith
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Location: Baie-St-Paul, Quebec, Canada

Post by Glen Smith »

Hi Chris, it sounds like you and your family had quite an adventurous Summer with Silent Ripple. Unfortunately there isn't one boat design that is good under all conditions but on the other hand, that gives us a reason to build more boats. :eyebrows

We would love to see photos of your Summer adventures.
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Bryan Hansel
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Location: Grand Marais, MN
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Post by Bryan Hansel »

Thanks Chris for sharing your impressions of the Freedom, my favorite tandem canoe. I've used mime with children as young as 6 (now 8 and 10), but have never experienced the same feeling. My nieces sit very still in the canoe though and even at their young age solo their own canoes. They've grown up paddling. Omer Stringer once said, "Canoe's aren't tippy, people just fall out of them." It just goes to show that one persons tippy may be someone else's stable.

I've done a number on my Freedom on rocky rivers, and have repaired it often. Now I pay more attention to back ferrying around rocks instead of running the river like I would in a plastic canoe.

The motor not working. I can imagine building a center seat, control console and steering wheel at the center. :wink

Bryan
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Chris
Posts: 105
Joined: Sat Nov 06, 2004 4:32 pm
Location: NorthWest Germany
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Photos posted

Post by Chris »

I have just posted some photographs of our summer/ fall journey to scandinavia - not all pictures are paddling pics, but feel free to have a look on what we did in the time out of the shop...

Best wishes

Chris

http://www.natur-im-sucher.com/schweden_2005/index.html

P.S. The kayak in the Polarmuseum in Tromsö is a replica of the original used by Fridjof Nansen.

Chris
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Scot T
Posts: 84
Joined: Wed Jul 14, 2004 2:45 pm
Location: Victoria, B.C., Canada

Post by Scot T »

Thanks for the pictures Chris. It's nice to see someone enjoying the canoe built with their own hands. Not only have you made a beautiful boat but you also have some excellent photos in your portfolio. Very talented fellow! :applause
Nemo
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Joined: Fri Nov 19, 2004 10:34 am

Post by Nemo »

Nice canoe and photos. Nice and lively looking crew. Bet they had a great time.
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