: My university has a large engineering department so I'm taking advantage of
: the composites laboratory in the next couple of weeks. This is my idea for
: a paddle: Form a carbon fiber sleeve into a shaft (how small a diameter
: can I go and still have enough strength?), then cover the shaft with a
: thin layer of wood in some way to give it some warmth. Then possibly cover
: the whole shaft and blade in glass. I found a place that sells ash veneer.
: Could I wrap ash veneer around this carbon shaft and get it to stay
: somehow? I haven't worked with ash before so I don't know how far it can
: be pushed.

Hi.
I've tried to do something similiar to this. I made a frame of spruce, filled it with waterproof foam, covered the whole thing with 1 layer of thin veneer and 1 layer of glass.
I tested the strenght by hanging the shaft in the roof and then let it hold my body's weight (120kg...). It was strong enough
The shaft was 138cm long with diam. 32mm and the weight was 238 gram. I thought I should mount paddle blades in each end, but I have no good solution for this. A paddle like this would end up with a total weight around 850 - 900 gram.

The link below point to my homesite about this, but sorry, it's still in Norwegian, but I promise to translate it very soon.

Best regards
Tom