: Shawn,

: I'm interested in how you prepared the blade end of the shafts and
: attached the blades. Got any pics of the "in process"
: shafts or of the final product. Would love to see how your
: paddle turned out.

: And yes, I'm planning to glass the shafts with 3.2oz cloth...

: Bob Beaullieu

Man, it's been a long time since I built them. I'm guessing 2002 or 2003. I used to have pics on my Geocities page (yes, that long ago!) and there should be a thread in the archives, but I'm guessing the externally linked Geocities pics are long-gone.

As you've done, there are two staves that are wider than the others to form the oval. I tapered these down to nothing at the tips of the paddle. It did leave a fairly pronounced spine. I like your approach with the plug, as you can cut right through the center of the shaft and not expose the hollow core.

At the time, I was going for lightweight, but I was also getting more aggressive in my paddling. I snapped both of them at the root of the blade, one of them during my ACA instructor certification test. :lol: The broken blade (along with a few other experiments) hangs on the wall in my den. :) I now paddle with either a commercial fiberglass-shaft Euro paddle or a Greenland paddle.

Cheers!
shawn