review of the Ke Nalu (Pono Bill) paddle

[PonoBill]

One more thing... Moloa was on the OC-1 during my downwind adventure... he is a Ke Nalu guy too... and was bummed that Ke Nalu isn't (yet) making outrigger paddles... he was saying that his outrigger paddle felt like a club compared to his Ke Nalu.

I know this is taking forever, but the two-piece version (there will be two and three piece versions) of the travel paddle is convertible to a OC paddle. I set the length up so it will work with an extended Ergo-T  to give a OC paddle range of 49" to 55".  We MAY be able to make it work so you don't have to take the adapter out, but if that doesn't fly then it will be a bit of a PIA since you'd need to take off the blade, drop the adapter out put it back together and put you handle in, but it means you can take an existing Ke Nalu paddle, turn it into an adjustable, a three piece travel paddle, or a two piece and an OC paddle.

Pretty versatile.

[Scottiver]

Thanks for all the replies and insights.

Well I cut her down to 80" and sanded the shaft fairly smooth on the top 40%, left the middle 10" or so unsanded and lightly sanded the bottom section.
I sanded it with some 1000 grit sandpaper as Bill suggests in his tuning video.
After calling around to various harware stores in the area, no one had any 1000 grit but one suggested an auto parts store and low and behold, they had 800 grit, 1000 grit and even 2000 thousand grit all for doing finish body/paint work.
The sandpaper was fairly expensive, $5.75 for four little 3"x 8" strips but oh well.
I was fairly skeptical about 1000 grit being able to smooth out the texture in the shaft but it worked quite well and fairly rapidly but not so rapidly that I had to worry about taking off too much too soon.

I'll take her out for another test session either tomorrow or Saturday and see how it goes.

[soepkip]

Soepkip:
Glad to hear that worked for you. A lot depends on how much you already have off the paddle. The shaft is actually straight for about 6 inches (15 CM). After you've removed that the taper starts, so each inch you remove eliminates some of the taper flex.

I removed 24 cm / 9,5 inch in total and the flexibility of my paddle is ok now.

I had a look at the picture of the Xtuf shaft on the KeNalu website:

Which one is the Xtuf?
The middle one I suppose because that is the one I have

[jdmotes]

 Correcto (it's the middle one)...         Paddle on,     JD

[supchino]

Had another great session with my maliko elite. Looking to grab a xtuf soon. Great product overall and am glad to hear about a 2-3 piece paddle.

[JakeSupTX]

Not to pile on with gear requests but is an adjustable Ke Nalu ever going to be in the mix? That would be great for my kids. They are pretty tiny for their ages so the upgradability would be great, should they ever decide to grow.

[PonoBill]

Actually I'm a little surprised they're not already here. We approved the final design about a month ago and went to production. It's going to be available as a complete paddle, a retrofit kit (with extended handle) and as a fitting only for people that already have an extended ergo T. There will also be a longer Extended handle available.

[JakeSupTX]

I'm assuming you are talking about the adjustable as opposed to the upcoming two and three piece paddles........will your system fit other brands of carbon paddles? My reason for asking is that I have a cheaper off brand carbon paddle that I'm more willing to chop down for the kids than a Ke Nalu. Hope I'm not off-base and asking dumb questions.

[PonoBill]

No such thing as a dumb question. Yeah, I'm talking about the adjustable bit. It's a stepped collar that glues in place and has Allen screws to clamp the handle. It can be glued on to any of our shafts at various lengths all the way to full length, so we actually will have an adjustable up to 95", which will be the first adjustable to suit the big guys.

Generally no, our shafts are smaller than most other companies and they are tapered, so there's kind of a double whammy. The handle end is 1" and the shaft end is 1 1/4"

[stoneaxe]

I'm finding the groove with the Molokai with my changed technique from the Kalama Kamp. I have to say...I think what Dave teaches matches well with the Ke Nalu design.

I've been changing back and forth between the blades and shafts and have finally settled on the big blade running on a 100 flex shaft. I still haven't tried the x-tuf S but I had a blast today paddling hard on an light upwind/downwind on Buzzards Bay. Wind was at 15 maybe gusts to 20 and I paddled a couple miles into it and then ran back. I love the workout that a good headwind gives me and I can crank on the Molokai with the lower hand grip and the lower stance helps cut through the wind better and track much straighter. I only switched sides today to give my right side a break.

The biggest change I notice though is on the downwind side. I'm catching bumps I never would have gotten a year ago. The bumps were small but in shallower sections they would stand up some. I straighten up a bit more to take advantage of the wind but when I'd hit one of those sections a slight step forward, drop the lower hand and get out and reach and crank hard for 2 or 3 strokes and I'm in. Some long glides on ridiculously small swells.

Bill, I have to say thank you to you and Lane. You know how much I rely on my paddle. In bumpy surf conditions, with a lot more standing around waiting, they give me the quick response I need for balance checks. Today I was in the groove with a big paddle that still feels like a feather and it let me move the board so smoothly and with such power even in this chop that I didn't even realize until after I was done that not only had I not fallen at all, I hadn't even done any balance checks. For me that's friggin amazing.

[crtraveler]

Ok, here's my review of the KeNalu.  First a little background...I'm 6'3", 240 lbs, strong paddler, technique is probably good, not great.  Usage will be probably 50 / 50 surf and flatwater (lake) paddling.  I'm coming from a Kialoa Shaka Puu and and old Southpoint fiberglass paddle, but have used the Werner Nitro as well as Spanker, so pretty used to high end carbon paddles, which should be a good basis for comparison.  Jim K made the purchase a breeze as usual (thanks Jim).



I went with the Maliko (mid size) w/ Xtuf-S (stiff) and Ergo-T Handle and left it uncut at 83.5 inches (I  think)  I've had two flatwater sessions on Lake Mahopac...about 1 mile yesterday evening and about 5 miles this evening.  No surf review yet....SuprBowl was with me and I think he came to the same conclusions after trying it for a while..

First off, let me say that I absolutely love the paddle!!  This is definitely the best paddle I have ever used.  I will say, that with all the incredible reviews leading up to my purchase, I was expecting the thing to paddle for me!!  I was a little disappointed that that didn't happen:).   I had to come back to the reality that I'm comparing this paddle to some of the best paddles in the world, so I need to be realistic in terms of my expectations....  Here's what I concluded...the KeNalu takes high end paddles to the next level in many, sometimes subtle ways.  I will discuss each component a little bit to try to give you a sense of my experience:

Handle -
quality, comfortable handle.  Feels a little bigger than other handles

Shaft -
first thing you notice is the "snakeskin" texture....it allows your hand to slide easily down the shaft, but it's more difficult to slide up.  When the shaft is wet this quality is exponentially increased. It almost gives me a "nails on the chalkboard", weird feeling of running your hand up the back of a snake.  It does provide a really good grip and almost feels tacky...you can dial this feeling to your liking with 1000 grit sandpaper apparently.  I think I'll leave mine the way it is, I like it, just have to get used to it.



Blade -
Great looking blade, nice shape, nothing incredibly different about how it looks

Now for the paddle as a whole....-

First of all, the whole hot glue thing makes it super versatile.  Easily change components, or what I'm excited about is traveling with it....the biggest issue I always have is that the paddle does not conform to the shape of the board in a board bag so now I'll just disassemble it and it will fit much better.  In water the paddle was VERY light and agile.  I didn't really notice the super solid early catch that has been described by many, it seemed similar to others, however it does enter the water very cleanly and seems to catch well.  During very beginning of my stroke, I noticed a very slight wobble at the very start of applying power which I'm guessing is just the paddle settling into its path and correcting my positioning of the paddle in the water.  I noticed that if i really concentrated on form, it didnt happen as much.  Once it settles in, it really is wobble free and very stable as everyone has said.  The release was very clean.  The recovery is incredible because of the swing weight.  The flex of the shaft is perfect for me, I wanted a stiff shaft w/ just a bit of flex at the beginning and that is exactly what this has.  I suspect I will notice more of the "stacking of power" of the shaft once I get it in the surf.  In comparison, it is a little stiffer shaft than my Kialoa.

Sorry for the lengthy review, but I've been super excited to review the paddle.  I'm thrilled with it and in the end, don't really see any reason to use anything else.  Thanks for a great paddle Bill!!



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[suprbowl]

Ditto!! Can't wait to get mine!

[PonoBill]

If you're feeling wobble, try loosening your bottom hand. Just relax it as much as you can.

[TN_SUP]

Did anyone else cringe at the blades sitting on stones?

[Strand Leper]

My son took all of my Ke Nalu paddles to Coronado for the weekend... Even the paddle that said
DON'T TOUCH THIS PADDLE on a sign above the paddle. I decided to cut him a break and not make him get up at 4 to meet me for my surf. Kneecap lent me an old Kanaha. Wow!  That was a really tough session. Using an entirely different paddle... On a small volume SUP, let's just say that there wasn't a ton of confidence.   Fun little waves. I missed
My Ke Nalu something vicious. Still trying to work out an appropriate punishment for Jr.  So far, I am stuck on "grounded for life."