> Hi John

> Good to hear from you. Your post is the type of thing that makes this BBS
> a great resource - everybody has their experience/knowledge and freely
> shares it here.

> The engineering support is appreciated. Your "numbers" have
> encouraged me to make a serious study of making a good hollow wooden kayak
> paddle shaft [I think some of my bow making experience will help here].

> Knowing the rest of the guys - I am sure there will be friendly
> competition as to see who can come up the best lightest/strongest design.

I think you could really decrease the wall thickness if you planned to glass the outside of the shaft.

Cut a thin strip of 4 oz. or 6 oz. glass (slightly wider than the circumference of the shaft) and saturate it on the sanded shaft. Spiral-wrap the entire glassed shaft with masking tape or electrical tape to squeeze out all excess resin and air. This should get you to nearly the optimum resin-glass ratio so you get all the stiffness you'd expect from the glass, but no extra resin weight.

Call it "Poor-Man's Vacuum Bagging"!

I know of a guy who built a 20-lb. carbon-fiber bike that way. I'd love to try my hand at building a mountain bike, but I'm not really into biking! I'd also love to build a drift boat or canoe, just because I think scuppered gunnels look cool and would be fun to build! (No thanks to Ross!)

Shawn