>>60190OP, I'm not sure about all the materials specifics, but get something decent, like an Old Town, if you go the plastic route. There are a lot of sort of "off-brand" canoes that you can find at places like Sam's Club or, I guess, cheaper outdoors stores, but those tend to be really heavy, IME. I would be wary about something that is branded with the name of a company that makes magazines. It's probably a fine general purpose canoe, but I just doubt it would be made for enthusiasts. Canoes are big things, and while the price may or may not be an investment depending on your income level, you're still going to have to live with your purchase because they're just not easy to throw out. Get a good one.
>>60369>you can bash out pretty much any dents.I don't think you're thinking about canoe damage the same way we are. My experience with aluminum canoes has been mostly rentals, so they're all banged up already, but the difficulty with them, IME, is that the most common damage is slow leaks along the seams. Whereas plastic canoes are made from one single piece of plastic, aluminum canoes are made of several pieces of aluminum, and have weak points at the welds. I think a decent aluminum canoe is probably about as strong as a decent plastic one. The issue is how much water you like seeping in while you're not doing activities that would typically get water into your boat. Plus, they tend to be heavier than plastic, which is less nice.
There is one really nice thing about aluminum canoes. They're cheap. Sometimes people abandon them on the sides of rivers, or they fall out and the canoe washes away so you can find them for free. If you want some cheap canoe that you can just do whatever in (maybe you live next to an otherwise small creek that floods sometimes), there's something to be said for just getting an ex-rental off someone's hands or something for <$50, or finding one for free, and then you have a canoe to play around with.
