When Ana and I came south for Rec School, we made a short detour over to Garfield (Avoca, actually) to test paddle the Arkota that Louis and William at Two Brothers are putting out. I was a bit impressed by the boat, as it came closer to my "ideal" 16 footer than any I've seen recently.
But, being a picky %@**, I really wanted a red boat and wished to install my own seats and thwarts, so I asked Louis to let me know when he'd have a red one in stock. He did so, and a couple of weeks ago, we headed down to pick up a "nearly bare" hull.
Then I got to thinking that I'd surely like to spend the weekend down in Arkansas paddling and not working on a boat, so I asked Louis and Bill to make me another one (this one in blue...), but with some significant outfitting changes.
They were willing, so I sent the following specs:
1) Widen the canoe to 36” by installing a wider portage thwart at the center position.
2) Move each seat 12” closer to the center of the boat.
3) Eliminate the thwart behind the portage thwart and install a shorter one 20” in front of the bow seat.
The intent of the changes:
The widening of the boat serves two purposes:
1) Moving the gunwales out serves to increase the final stability by forcing the hull walls out in the center. This change allows much more aggressive heeling of the canoe, as its resistance o heel increases as it is leaned over farther. (There is a tiny increase in initial stability, but that is of little importance, at least to this paddler.)
2) Due to the geometry of the hull, the widening also pulls the bow and stern of the boat up, increasing rocker. Since there is no industry standard for measuring rocker, I cannot report the “before” and “after” rocker with any meaningful numbers. This change allows the boat to turn more effortlessly. For what the fact is worth, the increase in rocker should also make the boat somewhat slower and make it track less well, but these characteristics are also of no importance for my purposes.
The centering of the paddling positions serves to centralize the mass of the paddlers in the canoe, reducing rotational inertia: this makes the boat spin with less effort and stop spinning with less effort. Most tandem canoes are set up with the seats rather far out from the center, making the mass of the boat similar to that of a barbell in configuration: this spacing makes for more cargo room in the center but hinders any turning capability of the canoe.
NOTE: Bill and Louis at Two Brothers Canoe have set the original seats in a much more centralized position on their stock Arkota than most manufacturers have done, but I wished it to be “even more so.”
With the seat changes described above, the need for an additional center thwart (for hull stiffness) went away. I had the bow thwart installed to give the bow paddler a place to anchor gear and to use as an assist in entering and exiting the boat.
Louis and Bill managed to get these items set up, and we picked up two boats (one to the above specs and one unoutfitted) on Friday, September 17.
Eric Esche, Ana and I put the modified boat onto Beaver Lake for its first outing the next morning: we tried it paddling tandem with two different sets of paddlers and all three of us paddled the boat solo (kneeling or sitting, as each preferred, using the bow seat with the boat turned backwards.) The results exceeded my expectations.
Padded tandem, the canoe turned almost as well as a dedicated whitewater boat but seemed to retain quite a bit of glide (not usually found in whitewater hulls.) The final stability was such that, even paddling an unfamiliar boat, we had little hesitation in heeling the boat until the gunwales touched the water.
On Saturday and Sunday, we got to test the canoe on Big Sugar Creek, the Elk River and on the Buffalo. The initial impressions gained on the lake held true when river paddling, as the canoe seemed to be right at home, especially when the going got tight in the quicker sections with obstacles.
Since bringing the canoe home, I've moved the center thwart another six inches back from the bow seat and will shortly replace it with a true kneeling thwart for more balanced solo paddling. I've also replaced the original 1/4” seat, thwart and handle carriage bolts with #10-24 stainless machine screws for easier removal and lighter weight.
All in all, the Arkota has far exceeded my expectations, as I had despaired of finding a currently-manufactured 16' canoe that would exhibit the turning capabilities of a whitewater boat while retaining the low profile of a lake boat. The Arkota does all of that and more, for a price that is quite astounding (The most similar canoe is probably an Esquif Canyon, at roughly twice the price plus freight!)
By the way, the Arkota is not a lightweight. The brothers use a much thicker layup of Royalex than anybody else does nowadays. This does add to the weight, but it also makes for an incredibly stiff and strong hull.
If you happen to be looking for a river tandem, be sure to look the Two Brothers Arkota over and give one a test paddle before deciding. If the characteristics that you are looking for are described above, it might just be the right boat. And the brothers just might be willing to outfit it your way.
Be well.
al
