The paddles.

     This is how I will make the paddles for the canoe. One for myself and one for my 6 year old daughter Megz. I started by buying a piece of reclaimed 6" x 2" x 8'. This is a few inches shorter than I actually needed but they should still work OK.

     There were a few methods for getting the right length of paddle for an individual that I found. I used what I think is the easiest. Stand straight and measure from your chin to the floor. Thats it. If it works out right, or wrong, I'll let you know.

     In my case, working with reclaimed timber, I had to clean up the timber first. This meant using an old chisel to get some cement patches off and an old scraper to clean off some mud.

     Next I sharpened a pencil after breaking the pointed bit off! Good start. There are some knots in this timber so I looked at their position and worked out where to actually cut it so as not to have a knot in the handle section of either paddle. Luckily this was possible.

The back of my carport, in the bench is what will be Megz paddle.

     After carefully marking out the timber with my newly sharpened pencil I made a series of cuts down to just above the lines.

First set of cuts, just the chiselling to do now!

     It was then a matter of much chiseling ( that sounds like a English village name, Much Chiseling or, my favourite, Nempnet Thrubwell ) to remove the waste on two sides. This process is then repeated on the remaining two sides. At this stage it looks a mess.

First two sides chiselled out and second two cut.

It'll work........eventually??

      Then it's back to the chisel and the plane to begin rounding the handle and shaping the blade of the paddle. The idea here is to get the waste down to the stage where you can start sanding. TAKE YOUR TIME!!!

*$%&+*&^%$£"&^$*(*^&(*%

     NNNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!! .........It snapped.........................*%$£*%$*.

The lesson for today is *$£& the paddle making. Buy the *$&^%*"^ things.


    Ok, I eventually stopped biting the door and calmed down. I then decided to completely ignore the plans I had for the paddles and made it up as I went along out of off-cuts I had lying around.

Megz paddle is on the left, mine on the right.

They're not perfect I know but not bad either.

   I think the mistake I made was going to thin in the area where the shaft meets the blade, and next time I'll use a hardwood.

     The two above are made from a length of 50mm x 50mm pine and 6mm ply left over from the canoe build.
It worked out quite well. My paddle is a bit heavier than I would like but I am going to make another quite soon, well I need a spare!