Advertised Weight of Canoe is Wrong

I recently purchased a 16ft Old Town canoe and the advertised weight is 65 lbs. To check to see if this is accurate I weighed myself on my bathroom scale and then again with the canoe on my shoulders and found that the canoe actually weighs about 75 lbs. Has anyone else come across this same problem??

A Thought
Not sure on your bathroom scales and your own weight but some scales tend to become less and less accurate the higher the weight on them is - still 10 pounds is a long way out!

NO! Say It Ain’t So!
My experience is that kayaks and canoes that actually weigh in at specs are the exception to the rule. I’ve had boats that were easily 20# over specs

give it to me
a couple WW runs, it’ll be advertised weight:)

Yep, its normal for the weight to be off

– Last Updated: Jul-03-08 10:31 AM EST –

And did you ever notice that EVERY boat is good at EVERYTHING? "Yep, this 16 foot flatbottom is great on rock gardens, carves like a hot knife through butter"

Hmmmmm…
…must be women putting those weight specs on there.

Not only it’s almost always off,
It’s almost always heavier. Never lighter!

It Kinda Depends
Some manufacturers are honest, some aren’t.



You’ll find most high end manufacturers; Bell, Grasse River, Hemlock, Hornbeck, Placid boats, Savage River, Swift, Vermont and Wenonah are pretty much on.



Benthic feeders like Old Town and Pelican and the roto-molders seem a little more casual with “facts”.



Part of this is the manufacturing process[s]. Hand lamination introduces variation with temp, humidity and skill of the crew. We got +/- a couple lbs per skittle at Bell with good crews.



Wet bagging lessens that variation. Infusion lessens variation even more. That said, we cut all the fabic in our hulls with jigs, infuse precisely weighed resin amounts, and still get +/- 1/2 lb skittle weights, and no, it does not correlate with atmospheric pressure. ??



I can understand weight variation with Royalex/Royalite sheets because the sheets seem to vary. Rotomolded craft seem to need the exact same weight of pellets dumped in the heated mold every time, so variation there must have some other cause. It may come about with a pen.



Of course, wood, being wood, can vary quite a bit in density. You just wouldn’t believe how the raw material is produced.

The older I get, the heavier the
boat gets.



Why is that ?



Cheers,

JackL

My boats are always heavier
when I put 'em back on the car, than when I take 'em off.

Bell Weights
Small sample here, but my experience with the Bell Yellowstone solo, revealed their advertised weight was at least 5 pounds shy of reality.


Oxidation…
De older ah’ gits de more ah’ oxeedize, JackL. Cood be yer problem too?



Fat Elmo

half-pound variation?
that’s pretty sweet charlie.



you definitely have the most advanced, precise techniques that i know of in the industry.



hell, you should start building America’s Cup boats.

Benthic feeders???
Seems a little harsh for a description for OT. They fill an important niche in the canoe market, and many families (mine included) still use and love their OT.

I agree it is not the canoe of choice for the advanced paddler or the purist (unless we are talking old canvas and wood OTs).

I agree
OTs are pretty durable. You see the same boats dragged for blocks in the Kenduskeag race year after year.



I doubt that many other boats would be as happy with that treatment…

OT Canoe
The 75 lb 16ft OT canoe that I have is made of fiberglass. Even though it is heavier than advertised I really love it. It handles well on flat and moving water and extremely stable when taking my kids along. I also wouldn’t put OT in the cheap category of canoes since I spent over $1,100 for it.

Anyone who has paddled with me has heard
me say “There are no light boats at the end of the day!”.



In my experience with several Wenonah, Sawyer and Bell canoes, weights have been right on or a pound or two below advertized.

Don’t feel bad.

– Last Updated: Jul-03-08 3:03 PM EST –

If you buy a Royalex boat from Wenonah, the weight will be pretty close to what they say it should be, but the length is likely to be 6 to 8 inches shorter than they tell you it is. You'd think it would be a lot easier to be "honest" about the length than the weight, but when it comes to building Royalex hulls, they seem to have trouble with that part.

For advertised weights in general, the posted weight is normally based on a particular version of the boat, with different trim options (different gunwale materials being one major variable) having a different weight.

Finally, I don't think you'd have any problem finding bathroom scales that are in error by six or eight pounds at that boat's weight, and such an error could be a lot more if you stood on the scale holding the boat and then subtracted your own weight. It could be that the weight difference you see would be a lot less if you used a better-quality scale.

Ever notice that if you …
…lean one way or the other when you’re on a scale that the weight changes? Could it be that when you’re on the scale and holding your boat it’s causing a redistribution of the weight on the scale’s platform? It might be worth placing a cement block or some other large object on the scale, weighing that, then balancing the boat on top of the block and weighing again.



Just a thought … never tried it myself but will try it this weekend with my kayak!

Your right, and it’s
all migrating right to my gut.



Cheers,

jackL