: In between waiting for fill coats to dry I decided to start working
: on a paddle. I'm using the instructions in Nick's book. I've got
: the two pieces of the shaft scarfed and glued and I'm ready for the
: next step - tapering the shaft. The diagram shows the last 1'9"
: tapering down to a 3/4" thickness. The text says to plane the faces
: that show the glue lines. Does that mean the end is evenly tapered
: front and back so that the centerline of the paddle is in the middle
: of the 3/4" thickness? Or do I do all the planing on the face of the
: square shaft which will become the face of the paddle?

: Chris

Chris,

No. It seems to be a bit confusing gluing paddles together. Before tapering, the cross section of the shaft out where the paddle blade halves attach is rectangular. The edges of the paddle blade halves glue onto the wider faces of the shaft. Since the blade is curved, most of that rectangular shaft will be behind the back of the blade out at the paddle tip. The taper you cut off is to remove that rectangular chunk, from tip of the blade back to about the midpoint of length of the blade so the back of the shaft matches the curve of the back of the paddle blade .

Boy did that clear this up. Easier done than said.
Dave