Carbon paddle blade build

[Vawtec]

Came out OK. A few dry spots. Bad bagging job, no breather and the bag wasn't tight but still a nice glossy surface

[Vawtec]

I traced the outline of the old blade onto the foam and removed the excess.
Then feathered the foam down to the edges.
The foam is cut back from the edge so I can build up some carbon to thicken the edge.

[Vawtec]

Used strips of carbon fabric around the edges.
Wet out everything and vacuum bagged, with breather this time.

[stoneaxe]

Finished? How did it come out?

[Vawtec]

Out of bag.
Epoxy bled onto back side. Will need to sand off
Traced old paddle and cut out with coping saw

[Vawtec]

Sanded both sides and edges.
Sanded the stub end a bit to fit in shaft

[Vawtec]

Used West Systems with high density filler applied to inside shaft and stub end
Aligned shaft and blade, cleaned up squeeze out and let set.

[Vawtec]

I was afraid I damaged the inside of the shaft when I drilled out the plastic stub end of the old one so I wrapped the shaft with carbon tow. Used duct tape to start and stop the wrap.
Put a coat of semi gloss polyurethane on the blade to bring back some gloss. Should have used gloss but I didn't want to buy anything for this.

Took it out surfing last night in choppy shoulder high waves. Definitely felt stiffer than the old blade. Paddled fine.

I got to reuse the old shaft and adjustable handle and saved about $200. Could be fairer if I took some more care shaping the core but it works. Nobody's going to go in business doing it this way, but you can save some money. This blade is very strong and light, could easily be fiberglass. If I had to buy material for this it would have been glass.

[TallDude]

That was a lot of work for a paddle blade, but it turned out right. Nice job.

[surfcowboy]

Love it, this is how we all learn.

Would it be easier to shape the whole thing as one piece and just chip out the foam from the frog?

I want to do one of these myself. Keeps me out of trouble.

[Vawtec]

If you try to shape the foam core by itself it's very weak and flexible. Tough to get a good shape. The spine is probably overkill. If I did it again I would skip the spine, shape one side, glass it. That would give it some support so you could shape the other side, then glass it.

[surfcowboy]

Hadn't thought of the flex in the blade. That must be why they are molded.

If i do it I'll try a stringer down the middle like a board and yes, one side at a time.

I have to get a little bagging rig started here.

[magentawave]

Nice job and thanks for sharing! Did you consider slapping some cloth on both sides of the broken paddle head?

[jpeter]

Very good job.

Seems rather similar to a back-country, packable, snow shovel I made over 15 years ago.   I read this thread a while back,  but had to use the shovel today.  (Stuck car)

It interests me that you made a foam core on the paddle.   The shovel blade I made has no deliberate thickness to it,  It is quite strong with zero flex.   

I built the blade with a carbon and Kevlar layup on a steel construction shovel covered with saran wrap.  I vac bagged that part.   The narrow dia shaft is a re-purposed mountain bike handlebar that I made years before.

Makes me think about building something,  good to see people with a just build it attitude !

Jay

[supuk]

here is a few pics of a blade I built a few years ago for a friends kid, it was about 70sq" I think  just with a pvc core the pics may be of some use. apparently its still going strong and often gets used to dig holes in the sand which is probably better than most shonkey paddles that come from certain country's.