Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Alaska General Purpose Boat x NO TRAILER

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For a Jeep Cherokee or short bed Tacoma, would a square stern freighter canoe or an inflatable be a better rig for pretty easy water? Let’s say the motor will be the Backwater SWOMP GX 200 or something in that weight class. I need to be able to load/unload it by my lonesome. If the inflatable must be inflated upon arrival, I can live with that. I guess a johnboat would work if light enough.
Will a long-shaft rig work well with a canoe?
Thanks!

Gruman Sport boat would be ideal for what you want launch wheels that bolt to transom for loading unloading. A cargo rack for your motor with a motor bracket. Inflatable with your sun will be an issue over time. Ran a Gruman Sport boat for 15 plus years bought a Saturn Kaboat for easier storage only inflatable that performed the same as the Sport Boat. The G Sport boat is wider than most square sterned canoes and more of a planing hull.

No bud, this is for AK. Not AZ. Sun not an issue.

A good inflatable will be heavier than a canoe, but extremely stable, unsinkable, capable of very shallow draft while safely carrying enormous weight, but does not track well with motor, paddle or oars. Best material is Hypalon, far superior to PVC. Deflated, it is way easier to transport and store securely. Also they can be much faster, handle waves far better and will handle a much larger range of horsepower than a canoe.

I've lashed more square stern canoes on various 4wd's than most anyone. At least a dozen different styles, and at least a dozen different 4wd's.

The kaboat is garbage for many reasons, and id rather have a square stern.

Anything shorter than 17 ft is too limiting from a sportsman's perspective.

One of the best square stern canoes I've used, was the old town discovery 17 ft. They stopped offering the 17 ft some years ago, so look for one used. They have a flat bottom, so good initial stability and better with a motor. They are made of polyethylene, so are as slick as uhmw when the dragging gets shallow.

Round bottoms or wineglass sterns on some square stern canoes don't do well with the 55 lb Back Water/gx 200 ultralight.

Over a decade ago, 17 ft discovery sport:

Got a 14’ jonboat to sell. Probably bigger than you want.

I've spent quite a bit of time in a Grumman Sport boat, I believe it was 17-18 footer that one of my hunting buddies use to own. He had it setup with a lift and ran an 8 horse Yamaha and we never had any trouble going where we wanted. We've ran the Tanana, Salchaket Slough, the Chatanika into Minto Flats, Hess Creek, and several of the smaller rivers/creeks along the Haul road, it did it all.

AKmtnhntr,

I always liked the flat bottom, narrow stern design of the sport boat. They work better with motor power, than most canoe sterns with rounded bottoms.

Heres a guy on the Chena, in a grum sport boat with a cheap Chinese motor, seem to scoot along very well:

Many thanks.
Can a Grumman Sport be put on top of a Cherokee?

Not sure, they run about 17 feet in length but with the proper rack setup I don't see why not.

Gruman Sport Boat is 15 ft 4" 43 inch wide

You had either a 15’ or 17’ canoe on that little car of your sister’s. For reference.

sportboats are getting harder to find.

Look at a Gheenoe.

I used to put one and my 17 foot mad river on top of my 92 Cherokee with yakima racks///bars. Id probably have a hard time doing it myself now lol

FWIW . I carry a 17' Colman Scanoe on top of a 1998 Honda CR-V. years ago carried a 12' aluminum car topper on top of a VW Beetle . --- Mel

Well now we got a Jeep Cherokee, so movin' up!

Sounds like something I'd do

You Jefferson, you!

That video posted was not in real time but speed up quite a bit

Yeah. I see the 10HP SWOMP from backwater is slightly over 100 lbs. Speed isn't happening with the aforementioned parameters. But better than a paddle.

Hum: Gheenoe's are very stable. Because they are a chopper gun boat they are very heavy. A 15' 6" Classic weighs 245 pounds depending on the guy spraying the mold. If you could manhandle the boat on top of a roof rack you would most likely exceed the manufacturers maximum weight for a roof load. A Gruman Sport boat weighs 110 pounds.

Bob, for heavier canoes, like my 260 lb 18ft x 60in freighters, I recommend steel truck rack only. Some full-size van style steel cargo racks have a slick roller bar system on the back and are equally good.

It comes down to technique and using your fking brain. Rather than hypothetical thinking out loud, speak from experience instead. The warn drill winch is what I recommend, to get the bow up on the back rack. Reposition the winch to forward bar to continue sliding.

The drill winch has free spool and reverse, so can be used for safe unloading and lowering of the canoe as well.

Mainer:
Please note I used the words "roof rack" and "roof load". Please also note that the ladder rack you show in the picture does not place any weight on the roof of the vehicle. The ladder rack transfers the road to the four corners of the box on the pickup.

I know what you typed. There are plenty of rugged steel roof racks for common 4wds like his Jeep, that can support the heavier loads and even the hundreds of lbs. of weight from two people sleeping in a rooftop tent.

This ARB roof rack on my old right hand drive hdj-81 landcruiser came off a rolled fzj80 landcruiser. Coupla bent bars and it was no worse for wear. I bought it for cheap. The ARBs are tough.

Again, speak from experience, rather than hypothetical bllsht .

Fascinating mainer, I had no idea that you could drive a winch with a dewalt. What model warne winch and dewalt drill.? Been looking at 1/2" drive 20v dewalt for a power lug wrench and for trailer jacks. Fill me in here, you freighter canoe sure is sweet. Mb

Nice rig.

ARB doesn’t make junk in my experience.

Bob,
I just leave an obsolete 18volt dewalt drill attached to the warn drill winch. DeWalt makes an adaptor so you can use the newer 20 volt batteries. I also use this set up to pull boat over wood piles and beaver dams to tall to jump. It will not pull a moose out of the water though, I hope warne makes a stronger one some day.

Thanks mainer I have a 20 volt brushless dewalt that has a 1/2' chuck sounds like all i need is the warn and a snatch block set up to handle it . Mb

These boats are a bit heavy for my intention.

Main: That is a good idea to use 3 racks to spread the load instead of concentrating it on 2 crossbars