My partner and I are mostly flatwater canoeists, but since moving to the Southwest, we’ve been forced to leave our comfort zone to get out on the water. Most of what we’ll be tackling will be class 1-3 rivers so we’re looking for something a bit more portable and robust than our fiberglass canoe. We don’t think we’ll like the enclosed feeling and necessity to roll out of a plastic yak, so we’re leaning towards inflatable duckies. I’ve narrowed it down to four:
Advanced Elements Straightedge 2 Pro (as a new user, I can only include 2 links, but I think you can find it…
Sea Eagle 380x
My main factors were price, something with a dropstitch floor, 2 way valves, and a tracking fin to help out on flatwater sections of rivers and reservoirs.
Any thoughts among these, or alternatives I hadn’t considered? Thanks!
I have no experience with any of the three, but I do have an Aquaglide Chelan 140 which is very, very similar to the Driftsun Rover 220.
The Star Outlaw II seems to be a whitewater specific boat. It has minimalist seats and rigging, and it looks like it’s got enough holes in the hull on either side of the dropstitch floor board to self-bail at a useful rate. But that means a wet ride on casual flat water days, where the holes also slow you down. And there’s no skeg, you’d have to glue on a removable skeg mount.
I’d call the Driftsun a recreational kayak. Given the similarity to my Aquaglide, I suspect those 6 little scupper drains are there for marketing cred and can’t empty the boat fast enough to be useful. It doesn’t seem like the best choice for tackling class II and class III water. The AE Straitedge appears similar except for the shaped bow entry. I can’t see its self-bailing system.
One thing I noticed about all 3 boats is that they’re around 12’, which is short for a tandem. Hopefully you and your partner find it easy to stay in sync. If you’re OK sticking with your canoe on flatwater and class I, maybe you could get two smaller whitewater kayaks for playing in the bigger stuff.
Out of those three the star will do best in ww but could be slow on the flats. You might also want to check out rocky mountain, saturn duckies. They are also on the cheaper end of things. The key with inflatables is good current or keep the distances very short . One advantage to a tandem is you will get a bit more glide even if you run it solo. If your duckie is wet to sit in and doesnt have closable scupper plugs, put some duct tape over some of the scupper holes toward the middle of the boat. It will drain slower but your butt may stay drier. My saturn tandem is very slow to drain in ww. On the metolious in oregon we filled that boat up like a bath tub on the first little drop. Not much maneuvering can be done.
The Sea Eagle 380 or the Saturn OK-420 are comparable. They are both 13’ and some change and come with detachable skegs. Both seem to do fine in Class I-III. big difference being the floors. The Saturn floor is raised so that only the tubes are usually in the water, so they track well even without the skeg. the Sea Eagle floor is even with tubes, so you sit a bit lower in it and carry a little more gear. The Saturn is less expensive, but has glued seams, so it has about a 10 or so year life, while some of the Sea Eagles models have welded seams and will last longer.
Sea Eagles: Awful. Just, awful. They make dangerous claims about their lower-end models being able to do class III. They are single-hulled, and deflate the moment it’s punctured. They are low pressure so wobbly and cause a lot of water drag too. The material all models less than about $500 use is categorically NOT up to industry standards for whitewater.
Driftsun Rovers: the 120 and 220 ARE very capable whitewater kayaks. The other models are recreational ones, but these have extremely tough materials, and more importantly–an extra protective layer of material along the bottom of the hull. I’ve run 20 class III and higher rivers in mine with the only puncture I’ve ever gotten being from a jagged piece of metal near the put-in when I shoved my kayak into it while trying to get it out of the way for other boaters. That was along the sides too, and the metal was as sharp as a knife.
My Sea Eagle did handle non-stop class III’s once–but you can run the Gauley in pool floats. It doesn’t mean they are going to survive every time, or even most times. I finally patched my Sea Eagle so much that I scrapped it, and couldn’t get a replacement despite having an extended coverage warranty. They fail catastrophically too easily, whereas true ww duckies usually only have tiny punctures due to material thickness.
Driftsun Rover owners swear by them, and it’s like a cult following when you run into another owner at a put-in. They do drain very well, btw, and are the lightest weight true ww kayaks that aren’t packrafts. They are also high pressure and essentially rigid with limited give (enough to absorb impacts, though).
My only complaints are that there’s a little too much standing water in them when all drain ports are open, but that’s not the same as overtopping water not draining. It’s just what comes in from below as a result of being on the river. They are also very flat bottomed, which is great for maneuverability but takes a few hours to really get used to. It’s actually likely bc they are flat bottomed and not V-shaped like, say, an Aire or NRS, that causes the water to get in. Having the plugs in solves that, and you don’t expect to stay dry when you take the plugs out to begin with either.
I have a Sea Eagle 300 which I’ve paddled up to class III and I have no complaints about its’ performance. While I prefer my hard shell kayak, I can surf, ferry, and eddy out in the Sea Eagle. It isn’t as maneuverable as a hard shell but it is much more stable and less prone to flipping. It is also a wet ride. There are better duckies on the market but they are also more expensive. It all depends on what you want to do on the river and the tradeoff between stability and maneuverability.
None of the boats on your list are up to whitewater conditions. They will easily get punctured and fail.
Consider boats made by raft companies like AIRE, SOTAR, and many others. You need Hypalon or PVC to stand up to punctures. Vinyl boats don’t get it. I have had the experience of puncturing a PVC raft which is not good. Very helpless feeling having a leak a long way from help. Carry repair materials. Watch out for “pokey things” like logs, sticks and fractured rock.
Incorrect. PVC is PVC…It is the weld job that counts
First pic is me in my old Sea Eagle 380x. Third photo is my paddle partner, in his yum-yum yellow Star inflatable(I am in the red+white Thrillseeker.) We been running ledgey Class III & IV ww in all kinds of duckies for the last 15;years.
One doesn’t necessarily need to spend an arm and a leg(as with Aire)to get a durable quality IK. But generally, the better the warranty, the better the Duckie
Dropstitch floors started becoming more common in some of the lower end IKs so quality improved in some cases. It interesting to me that people assume that bladder boats are more durable. While you can replace the entire bladder I have actually found that when the vinyl bladder seams blew out on my tomcat that it was more catastrophic but you could replace each tube. If somebody wants a midrange priced duckie my advice would be to get a rmr for class II-III. If you got the cash and are willing to wait custom thrillseekers are the way to go. Aire force is a solid choice but pricey.
It is only a matter of time before the seams give out on my glued saturn tandem. One of my sevylor ds boats is still going strong after a decade! I upgraded the seat and added a thwart. Very wet wild ride! The orginal price for the sevylor was new $300.00. I’ve got more in that now with the upgrades.
I buy used boats of quality. I had an Avon 16 with an oar rig made of Hypalon. It was ancient but never leaked. I had an AIRE Jaguarundi a PVC cataraft with an oar rig. I paid $600 dollars for it because it was 25 years old. The equipment that came with it was worth more than that. Had to replace a zipper on it.
A decade is nothing in the life of quality inflatables. You have to be able to depend on them, especially a long way from help on over night trips with no road access.
