I just returned from paddling the Waterfound & Fon Du Lac rivers in Saskatchewan, and I have 2 problems with the Royalex hull of my Swift Dumoine. I was hoping some of you could direct me to good sources of advice to repair them. I like the canoe and want to keep it.
One night a bear bit two canine holes in the stern stem below water line loaded. I just taped them with duct tape ot finish the trip, but would like to do a more permanent repair.
I think the gelcoat never sealed to the royalex in places on the bottom outside of the hull. first it bubbled, but then with the wear on the rocks on the trip it has released and is pulling off in pretty large areas to reveal the white royalex.
Any information or especially links to explanations of how to repair these two problems would be greatly appreciated.
there is no gelcoat on a royalex boat. What you are seeing is the outside layer or color layer of the royalex and it sounds like it's seperating from the next layer to it. How old is the boat, this sounds like a defect that could get you a new canoe if the boat is not that old. Other than that I would refer you to Mike McCrea as to how to preserve your boat and I think he will say epoxy but he my want to know more about the damage. At any rate it doesn't sound like anything that will kill the boat because royalex is some pretty tough stuff and easy to patch. But with large areas of the skin coming off I would contact the maker and send some photos. I just checked the Swift web site and it says all canoes are warrented against defects in materials and wormanship for life of the hull. Certainly the bear damage doesn't count but the blistered hull should be covered.