Storing a Wood-Canvas Canoe

by Mike Elliott, Kettle River Canoes

Proper storage of your wood-canvas canoe is essential to its long, rot-free life.  Finding a suitable place to store it is one question.  The other is how to store your canoe.  I’m sure there are as many ways to store a canoe as there are canoes.  Let’s look at a few.

As I have mentioned in previous blogs, the fungi that cause wood rot can only grow in warm, damp environments.  Therefore, it is best to store your canoe:

1) Upside-down; 2) Well off the ground; 3) In a cool, dry space away from rain, snow and ice; 4) With lots of air circulation.

Some examples of suitable spaces include:

1)  Carport; 2) Covered Porch; 3) Unheated Garage; 4) Lean-To Shelter (against a building).

It can be a challenge to find a suitable location.  However, once you have identified a spot, the next step is to develop a storage method.  I will describe three possible systems.  From them, you ought to be able to come up with something that works for you.

1. A Basic Rack – Does your space have a solid wall on one side?  Is there enough room away from the wall to allow access into the space?  If so, simply build and install two large racks about 7’ (2 meters) apart.  The example illustrated here is made from spruce 2×4’s.  The joints are glued and screwed to ensure a sturdy structure.  The top edges of the rack can be rounded and/or padded to protect the gunwales of the canoe.  Make sure the racks are secured well to the wall (with lag-bolts or through bolts and washers).

2. A Roller System – Is your space is long and narrow?  Is it awkward or impossible to access the space from the side?  In this case, it may be possible to feed the canoe into the space from one end.  For this situation, install two support racks about 7’ (2 meters) apart.  Each support rack is a  length of standard 1” (25 mm) steel pipe at least 40” (one meter) long threaded through a  length of 1½” (38 mm) ABS pipe at least 36” (90 cm) long.  Install each steel pipe securely at the desired height.  The ABS pipe acts as a roller and makes it easy to store the canoe in and remove it from a confined space.

3. A Hoist System – Is it possible or desirable to get your canoe up out of the way above everything else?  If so, try using a system of ropes and pulleys to hoist your canoe up and away.  Support the canoe with a length of rope wrapped around each end.  Tie a permanent loop in both ends of the ropes.  Use a carabiner to clip the ends of each rope together to create a support loop for each end of the canoe.  Then rig a length of ¼” (7 mm) braided rope (I use multi-filament polyethylene – MFP – rope) through a series of pulleys as illustrated above and install a cleat to secure the free-end of the rope.

Plank Repairs in a Model 44 Peterborough Cedar Strip Canoe

by Mike Elliott, Kettle River Canoes

One of my current canoe restoration projects is a 16’ Model 44 Peterborough Cedar Strip canoe dating from before 1920.

The hull is in great shape except for a few areas where a plank has cupped.  I wanted to bring those strips back tight to the Rock Elm ribs.  This is how I did it.

Once all of the old varnish was stripped from the hull (both inside and out), the first step was to soften the wood a little by pouring boiling water over the affected areas (both inside and out).

These canoes are held together with about 5,000 15-gauge copper canoe nails (7/8” or 22 mm long).

The original builders did not use pilot holes for the copper nails, but I took the precaution of drilling a 1/16” (1.6 mm) pilot hole first for each nail.  I tried my best to line up with the original nails to get as close to the centre of the 5/8” (16 mm) half-round ribs as possible.

To attach the ship-lapped planking strips to the ribs, the original builders used a solid wood mould and drove the nails straight through the plank and rib into the wood.

To simulate the solid wood mould and provide some backing while driving the nail, I used a small block of wood to receive the nail.

Once the nail was driven fully into the canoe hull from the outside, the wood block was removed to expose the point of the new nail.  Originally, once all 5,000 copper nails were driven into the hull, the canoe was removed from the mould.  It looked like an inside-out porcupine.

At this point the builder used a cast-steel “dubbing iron” to turn each nail along the rib and hammer it flush to the rib.  I used my wood-canvas canoe “clinching iron” to do the same job.  I set the iron against the side of the nail and pressed either towards the keelson or the rib-top as I tapped gently on the nail head with my cobbler’s hammer (A side-note here: the cobbler’s hammer has a wide head with a concave face.  You can hit the soft cedar as hard as you like without marking the wood).

Once the copper nail was bent over, I placed the clinching iron on top of the exposed nail and hit hard with the hammer to drive the nail flush into the rib.

When completed along the full length of the cupped cedar strip, the plank is sitting nicely against the ribs again.  Mission accomplished.

Rot in a Wood-Canvas Canoe: Causes, Prevention and Repairs

by Mike Elliott, Kettle River Canoes

Wood-canvas canoes, by their very nature, are subject to rot.  The problem is not entirely avoidable, but can be reduced.  Once every thirty years or so, damaged areas can be repaired.

Wood rot is caused by a number of fungi (Serpula lacrimans, Poria incrassata and Gleophyllum trabeum are among the most common).  The results turn solid wood brown and crumbly.  As you disassemble the canoe for inspection, affected areas often break apart into cubes when disturbed.

These fungal spores are almost always present, but can only grow when certain conditions exist.  Wood rot fungi need three basic ingredients in order to grow: 1) moisture; 2) no air circulation; 3) a warm environment.  Parts of your canoe (such as the outwales, stem-tops and inwale-ends) are normally covered and protected.  If these areas are allowed to stay warm and moist, they become prime environments for fungal growth – in other words, rot heaven.

To prevent rot from forming in your canoe, store it upside-down off the ground in a cool place that has lots of air circulation.  A lean-to shelter next to the house makes an excellent canoe storage area as does a carport.  Proper storage of your canoe is your prime defense against rot.  Another step is to maintain the exposed wood with a fresh coat of spar varnish every few years.

When restoring your canoe, a number of things can be done to both repair the damage and prevent rot from developing in the future.  First, use an epoxy sealer or wood hardener to solidify the wood in areas that are likely to rot at some point.

Areas already rotted must be cut away before starting repairs.  Once you are back to solid wood, scarf in new wood and rebuild the affected areas.

Once the repairs are complete, apply a combination of boiled linseed oil and turpentine to all exposed wood.  It doesn’t stop water absorption completely, but it is a great preventative measure.  As a general rule of thumb, it is best to seal a component before attaching it to the canoe.  For example, many outwales look great from the outside.  However, water can get trapped under them and allow rot to attack the bare wood on the inside surface.  If you seal the entire outwale before it is attached, water cannot get to the wood on the inside surface which means that rot cannot develop there.

“The canvas is shrinking and pulling away from the gunwales on my wood-canvas canoe.  What do I do to fix it?”  I get this question fairly regularly.  Fortunately, it is a common problem with a straightforward solution.  However, it is usually not what you want to hear.  The canvas does indeed look as though it is shrinking and pulling away from the canoe.  It gets loose and starts to crack in places as well.  The answer is simple enough.  Over the years of use, water gets trapped under the gunwales and creates a damp environment – perfect for rot.  Since the only thing holding the canvas to the canoe are a bunch of tacks, as it rots and it breaks apart, it simply falls away from the canoe.