I purchased a 14 ft field and stream scout square back canoe! My dilemna! I don’t like these seats and like to replace them. Can I do this, what I should expect, and would I be ruining the integrity of my canoe!? I appreciate any advice!
I have no Idea what your canoe is like, but i have moved changed, etc seats on kevlar, fiberglass, royalex and plastic canoes. I have no qualms of drilling through the hull on any of them
I normally use a combination of aluminum channel for the side supports, aluminum tubing for the cross supports with a combination of aluminum rivits and stainless steel bolts.
I can only caution: If you are a heavy weight, you might need some sort of center support(s)
If you are a do-it -yourselfer, go for it. If not, have someone else do it for you
Out of sixteen boats, I have made every one of ours custom for us
appears to me, those seats ARE the structural integrity of that canoe. Looks like the old colemans, which I saw folded up and torn in pieces alongside a few rivers… I wouldn’t touch the frame portion of the seat. Also, don’t strap that canoe down too tight as there is little integrity in hull strength, and a lot of flexibility in that material. Coleman used to put an aluminum tube in that groove down the center to attempt to maintain hull shape.
https://www.fieldandstreamshop.com/p/field-stream-scout-canoe-18fnsufssctcnxxxxpsc/18fnsufssctcnxxxxpsc?uniqueID=3986419&color=Green
Daggermat is correct. If you try to replace those seats you will almost certainly ruin the structural integrity of the canoe
That canoe is one of a plethora of less expensive canoes made out of single-layer (solid) polyethylene. Single-layer PE hulls are relatively easy and cheap to manufacture, but the material is very flexible and makes for a very “floppy” hull unless the hull is very thick (and prohibitively heavy) or unless they are provided with some sort of endoskeleton to support the hull. What is more, solid poly is heavier than water and will sink unless some type of supplemental flotation is provided.
In that particular boat, the three “seats” substitute for thwarts to support the gunwales. The “footers” that extend down from the seat bottoms to the floor of the boat support the hull bottom and reduce what would otherwise be excessive flex. And the seats likely contain either foam or sealed air spaces so that the hull does not sink out of sight if fully swamped.