The Gear Shed - Aire Cub Review
Aire Cub Specs
Material Type: PVC with Internal Urethane Bladders
Chafer: PVC
Seat Material: PVC
Seam Type: Welded
Floor Type: Aire Cell
Overall Length: 10 feet 7 inches
Width: 5 feet, 2 inches
Bow/Stern Rise: 7 inches
Tube Diameter: 18 inch diminishing tubes
Chambers: 2 Hull, 1 Floor, 2 Thwarts
Weight: 61 lbs
Aire Cub Review
The Aire Cub is the newest in the Aire line up built on their solid reputation for boat design. After talking with Aire about their design process a lot of thought and input went into creating a strong play boat for rafters. The Hyside Mini Max has long been the bench mark play boat and this boat is Aire’s answer to that niche in their product line. The boat is a light weight design with slightly diminishing tubes at 10.5 feet in length. It is pretty comparable in size to many other play boats on the market. Aire did a great job with the overall shape of the boat creating a raft with great stability for its class and fantastic acceleration.
Ideal Uses for the Aire Cub
This boat is a dedicated playboat, but can perform pretty well when creeking. Ideal conditions for this boat are most rivers under 1000 CFS or tight channelized low volume runs. It slides well and moves over rocks with ease and is super easy to paddle. The Cub weighs in at 61 lbs which is amazing to see boat builders taking our needs for lighter weight boats more seriously. We have carried this boat for miles in to remote put ins with no road access and so far it has made that task even easier. If you head out to the local play wave you will have a great time with this boat. Ideally you will want to use an r2 team in this boat on daytrips only.
How the Cub handles in the water?
If you are new to using a play boat or working with this class of boat you may want to take a look at our discussion on boat classes. Boats in this class are built with performance in mind and the cub is no exception. If you are used to running a more common 13-15’ boat you will feel like you just bought a tiny sports car. If you already run play boats you will notice some pretty key features right off the bat.
Acceleration for this boat is fantastic with it being a very fast boat off of the first paddle stroke. If you need to make a lot of moves or quickly pass another raft in continuous whitewater this is a great craft. What it has in acceleration it definitely lacks in top speed. The raft is not fast and you may find yourself needing to charge a feature and not having the power to punch through it compared to any other boat on the water. This boat is all about finesse and Kailee as well as other female boaters have mentioned that it compliments their preferred boating style.
The boat surfs well and is generally stable for its class and tends to move like it is adhering to the surface of the water. The Aire cell floor will fill with water adding some ballast and creating a low center of gravity so it feels more stable.
This boat is very edgy and will slice into eddy fences better than any boat of its class. This means you can stand the boat pretty far on its side and still be tracking the direction you want super well. You can also perform quick eddy catches and peel out into currents with ease.
How tough is the Cub?
When Aire let us demo this we told them that we will probably wreck this boat and they should not expect it to come back in great condition. Well we tried to make good on that promise and we failed. From volcanic rock portages, to rocky dusty hikes in, to sliding down massive wet slabs of granite this boat stood up super well. One of the great parts about this boat is that the internal bladder system keeps the boat from getting pinholes in it.
On the downside the PVC does scuff pretty easily and we have noticed the chrome stripping off the d-rings, but that is pretty normal stuff. The major downside is that the thwarts are attached to the floor lacing via a camstrap integral to the thwart. This does tend to rub on the cord that holds the floor in and can cause abrasion. This is common to all Aire boats though and has not been a problem for our team. As the seasons go on though it would be a good idea to have extra straps/floor lacing with you should your camstraps wear through the floor lacing.
Important Considerations
The boat can feel pretty sluggish in a turn for a boat of its class. Although it tracks well the floor, is very flat so it creates a lot of drag when rotating.
Many other playboats have a much more rockered floor design to minimize on drag, however the flatter floor makes this boat difficult to boof. If the design had one major drawback it would be this. To really pull off a reasonable boof you will need to lie back before the drop. In so doing you will sacrifice a lot of power in the final seconds of executing the move. It is a hard move to pull off and we spent a lot of time flying out the front or rolling into the front compartment trying to get accustomed to the timing of a correct boof stoke.
Like all play boats the cub is super prone to flipping since it has a very narrow beam. The width is a bit of a double edged sword as you can slip smaller features and generally creek down stuff if you need to, however as with all play boats there is a price for that narrowness and that price is stability.
The boat only has 2 perimeter tubes so you really need to make sure you have a patch kit with you at all times. Also the valves on the 2 tubes are set with one in the bow and one in the stern so if you are rolling your boat regularly (not recommended for plastic boats) it will be a bit of a pain.
The floor in the boat feels very high compared to many other rafts. If you are tall with long legs it can make the boat feel very uncomfortable since you spend most of the time in a crouched position. Kailee also mentioned that the boat felt a little small in the main compartment for her and she is 5’4” with short legs.
Aire does not include thwarts with the boat standard so you will need to buy those separately so be sure to factor a couple of those into the price when you are purchasing the raft.
Space is at a premium in this raft so having a drybag, k pump, camera case, thwart bag, and spare paddles feels like the boat is pretty full. An overnight does work in this boat, but you will need a soft side cooler and a super minimalist setup. The best way to do it would be to flip the raft over and sleep on the bottom. The boat will feel super full and you may notice some of the performance diminish with that setup.
Is it worth the cost?
It’s important to remember what this boat is built for: light weight play boating. No boat is universal and this boat excels at quick maneuvers through tight moves. It is not a carry everything multiday rowing machine, nor is it a beginner boat. It helps to have some experience to get the most out of this little raft. If you are adding a second boat to your quiver or you are looking for something that will be a lot of fun on a variety of river it is definitely worth it. Aire’s solid reputation for customer service and the overall durability of the raft after everything we have thrown at it lives up to the hype. $3000 is a bit of money to pay for a small raft, but if you look at it from a per person basis; 2 people going in on this boat is $1500 per person. A new Jackson kayak would run you about $1400, so for a top end performance boat you are looking at a pretty similar price point per person.