Rob,

This is quite interesting. I too thought the loom must be egg shape and came to the same conclusions as you experienced with the test paddles: the D did not fit the picture. So you reversed it and found a solution that works very well. And you even managed to include the drip feature of the sharp shoulder edges! This is good, innovative design.

Obviously there is some real confusion in that picture. Taking it as a starting point one may go in two different directions, as Pete and Mike's ponderings show. This type of speculation as has unfolded here is great fun.

thanks,

risto

: Is the loom cross section an oval or an egg shape? Close examination revels
: it is not an oval. Is it really meant to be and egg shape? If it is, I
: assume the desired natural comfortable placement in the hand would be with
: the large end of the egg in the palm with the knuckle wrapped around the
: small end of the egg shape. If in fact this is the true shape of this
: section it would also make the flat blade face the power face.

: On my first attempts at this paddle style I had the flat surface of the D
: aligned with the flat blade surface as indicated in the drawing. What I
: found was that the shoulders at the blade/loom transition really hit my
: fingers very hard which made me want to round the shoulders considerably
: for comfort. Again, with the surveyed drawing so small, it is hard to tell
: how sharp or rounded this feature is. I felt that I had to round the
: shoulders too much to make them comfortable. I thought that if they were
: sharper, the shoulders would create a natural drip edge for water running
: down the blades.

: What I did was to reverse the D so the round part was in the palm facing the
: flat blade surface. This solved a number of problems. First this position
: offsets the shoulders at the blade/loom transition so they no longer were
: in the way as I slid my hand out to the blades. This allowed me to make
: the shoulders sharper, so they do act as a drip edge. Also by reversing
: the D shape the blade edges start at the top of the loom (relative to
: Zimmerly’s drawings) and angle down, right through the middle section
: (which now works) as the blade edges run down to the blade tips. This
: feels very comfortable to use and works well with fairly sharp blade
: shoulders.