When I asked if the Romany and British boats in general, were more strongly made than the lighter North American kayaks or if they were just heavier because of excessive resin in the layup, it was not my intention that we inflict destruction tests upon perfectly good boats. There are probably plenty of paddlers who do this quite well on their own boats at their own expense. I really just wanted to know if there was a pay back in durability for hauling a heavy boat around on my ageing shoulders. Even if there is, it might not be worth giving up light weight for battleship durability. John Winters' point is worth considering: How strong is strong enough? Again, all a matter of individual priorities. I once owned a British-made cruising sailboat that was touted by the manufacturer as being able to survive a drop of 20 feet to a cocrete slab. I'm sure that it could; it was a very heavy boat. It was also the worst sailing boat I've ever sailed [ but I did become very fond of its Swedish-made diesel engine which, in the short time I owned the boat, was used considerably more than the sails ]. It's all so subjective. Lightness is high on my list of priorities. As a paddling friend recently said, light weight boats get used more often. He owns a Romany Explorer. John *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Fri Jan 07 2000 - 09:03:06 PST
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