Paddles

In 2012 i wanted to build a strip build canoe, but I realised the limitations of my patience and settled for a paddle. Research began on youtube, or was it inspiration from youtube that started the idea? Anyway, I ordered Canoe Paddles – A complete guide to making your own, by Graham Warren and David Gidmark, and a spokeshave. I have already received an axe made by Gränsfors bruk as a gift for Christmas, so now the only thing remaining was the wood. 

However, first I wanted to prototype so that I didn’t mess up horribly with more expensive wood. I therefore started very small, making a Paella spatula in the shape of a paddle. When that was made and some minor lessons in wood fibre directions combined with using an axe for woodworking I went up in scale. 

So the seconds paddle I made from some left-over scrap soft-wood, it might be pine, and it is designed as deep-water lake paddle. Hence the long thin blade. It has never been paddled though since there is a knot from a branch just in the place where the load on the handle is as largest. Lessons learned. I decided that the long blade needed a long motif, hence the common european viper was photographed on it during some 3 tiring hours. 

I now felt comfortable to make the actual paddle and managed to get hold of some 30mm thick ash plank which was holding my paddle inside. I decided that the suitable blade form was going to be the ottertail from the book, even though I was surprised by the blade size of it. The mass produced cheap paddles I was used to usually had smaller blades, but I decided to trust the book and carry on. For the handle I wanted to have a flexible type with regards to how you use it. That’s why it starts to widen a bit from the top and also have the two widening bits. This enables one to hold the upper hand on the paddle sideways, and works quite well. At the time I was inspire by Haida art, which is where totem poles comes from, so I decided to do a turtle in my attempt at the art style. The whole paddle has been treated with boiled linsead oil, the blade more generously and the handle less. 

This paddle has been on at least two 1-week paddle trips and works very well. The springiness of the paddle helps alleviate the impact at the start of the stroke with the paddle and the paddle is generally nice to paddle with. There is a small annoyance i have with it. The annoyance is that when marking out hte thickness tapering of the blade, which would taper from handle thickness down to blade thickness during the top 3rd of the blade, I drew this tapering line to the centerline of the thickness instead of the intended thickness. This means that the blade ended up tapering too early and that the blade therefore bends a little to much at the top of the blade, which in turn means that there is a weak spot. The blade should bend more or less like a well made bow to avoid weak parts. Ohh well. The turk’s head from synthetic string was added later as a dropstop.

The last and most crude paddle I made I didn’t put that much time into and I didn’t have access to a workbench or spokeshave since it was during a scout camp. This was made entirely with an axe and knife, it is quite bulky but I expect it to work should you have nothing else. The figure was made over an open fire then carving out bits with the knife.