Thanks of the insight db. Did you feel like it was a reach to get your paddle vertical while sitting in the middle of the seat? With my Q16 I have to slide to the side a couple inches which is a pain when I want to switch sides with the paddle.

Yup. (To DB's post.)

The last six or so years I've borrowed solo boats instead of paddling my tandem Cruiser solo as I had done for a lot of years. When I was 130 lbs, my unloaded Cruiser was indeed squirrely! It was so squirrely I tried to tip it one hot afternoon with the wind blowing into a sandy beach campsite. It was damn hard to do intentionally!

I borrowed a Prism, a Magic and a Tranquility for I think at least two trips each now. All three are great. I see them each as different tools as I try to allow them do what they are good at. The Prism truly loved being paddled straight into the wind. The Magic with the rounder bottom, truly loved being paddled with the troughs that I would never trust doing with the Prism.

The Tranquility was a happy medium in a way and overall drier w/o the tumblehome. I want my paddle to be vertical, especially if I want to go straight paddling solo. To me, tumblehome just makes it more difficult to load and unload. I have no intention to heal any boat that far. I just don't paddle often enough to get that much of a feel for any boat - err tool.

I probably have over 10 different hammers and just like a hammer, these days a canoe is a tool chosen with a specific purpose in mind.

The seat in the Tranquility was interesting. Not only can you slide it back and forth (and if it were my boat I'd move the whole contraption back as much as possible as I'll kneel if needed) you can adjust the height and/or the front to back tilt which is a really nice option on a rental boat.

Solus I weigh about 175 now and am trying to get back to 165. My seat was originally hung with 4 bolts and wood dowel spacers. The wood dowels were cracking so I have changed the wood out for 3/8 aluminum tube. My first plan is to shift the seat back by putting the front bolts in the original back holes and drill to new holes for the back bolts. The lack of tumble home does cause for some knuckle banging on the gunwales for sure. That is another reason I was thinking of a different canoe an Wenonah or Bell.

I found myself without a solo canoe after having a Magic for several years. I rented a Tranquility for a week with the intent of taking it home after the week.  Instead I bought another Magic.  The lack of tumble home and its ability to catch the wind was what convinced me it was not the boat for me. I have sense found a smaller boat I like for solo trips better than the Magic. I use the Magic as a tandem with some kids.

The Tranquility that I rented had a sliding seat in it from the factory The factory installed slider allows easy adjusting for the seat position from a little to fare forward to way way too far forward.

Fallguy wrote on Nov 22^nd, 2014 at 1:32pm:


I wasn't going to bring this up, but your post and Solus opened the door, so I figure I'd walk on thru.

Fallguy, was I right about your solo seat being not dead center? If so, that "sweet spot" might not be so far that you need a elaborate sliding seat with all that adjustability or possible stress on the gunnels?

Just thinking out loud here, but what if you got some aircraft grade aluminum channel the same size/thickness as the hanging brackets you already have. Bolt those to the existing brackets using stainless carriage bolts and the existing holes. Allow the channel to cantilever over back toward the stern, say no more than the width of the seat. I think that a matter of a few inches and proper pack loading would have a great effect on handling.

You don't want to get the load completely off the existing hangar brackets, but I think you could go as far as having the front seat bar set to the middle of your existing bracket and the rear in the cantilevered channel.
If you wanted to get fancy, you could mill slots in the aluminum channel and be able to slide the seat in more increments.

Just a thought. Might prove worse than a hanging bracket, but could easily C-clamp the channel pieces in and move the seat and see how it looks and get a feel if it would stress the existing hangars to much?

Careful hanging the seat from the gunwales, especially if you're a bigger guy. Piragis has replaced a number of Bell hanging seats with floor mounted sliders after the brackets have broken or stressed the side walls of the hull (and Bell adds an extra layer of cloth in the center to support the seat). Generally a problem associated with paddlers of 200# or better. You can buy a complete floor mounted sliding seat and bracket from Wenonah.

I don't understand the difficulty people have with straight tracking hulls; much easier to learn to turn a hard tracking hull than to make a wandering hull travel straight efficiently.

Souris River have a sliding seat option for the Tranquility, was on my rental and a appreciated it.

Thanks for the input fella's.  I am working out  a plan for a sliding seat bracket that will hang from the gunwale that will allow me to hopefully find the sweet spot. But now we are in the hard water season and I am enjoying the early start to the Cross-Country ski season.

I rented a Tranquility two years ago and loved it. Beaverhouse- Cirrus - Kasakokwog- Quetico - Beaverhouse.  I wouldn't want to ever pad sf le another solo.

I'm 6'-2", 225, a duffer that loves paddling, sit, hit and switch with a straigh shaft.