Western Red Cedar is what I have used to make several. A few were made from 1"x 4" cedar boards from Home Depot, glued together.
For a small person, who is or will be growing quickly, you can use a single board. Lots of info on building on line.
BUT, GP dump water in your lap so aren’t ideal without a skirt.
Okay thanks, that’s very good to know!
I wonder if I could carve a water stop lip in the shaft that would keep the water from running back on you? I have a friend with a very long wood lathe. That might be the ticket.
@Sam1911 said:
Okay thanks, that’s very good to know!I wonder if I could carve a water stop lip in the shaft that would keep the water from running back on you? I have a friend with a very long wood lathe. That might be the ticket.
Here’s an idea you might try that would be a lot easier, and probably a lot more effective. During my first summer of solo canoeing I used a double-blade paddle, and I found that the standard drip ring on my Werner paddle was only marginally effective at controlling water drips. I didn’t care for having wet pants all the time while paddling, so I modified the drip rings by adding rubber drip cups and that came very close to stopping all water drippage, and that was pretty cool since every other double-blade paddler I talked to said if I was going to use such a short paddle, there was nothing at all that could be done to keep myself dry. Obviouisly they were wrong. Then when I got a Mohawk double-blade paddle that had no drip rings, I simply made a pair of rubber cups that would do the job all by themselves. The photos below are of those drip cups.
This method will stop nearly all the dripping, even with a nearly vertical stroke. I used rubber from an automotive inner tube. I sewed the cup shape with carpet thread, and applied sealant to the stitching, but that’s hardly needed since the cup only needs to hold water for a brief moment.
Pardon the spider webs, dust, and also the cracked condition of the rubber. This paddle has been sitting unused in my garage for about 13 or 14 years
.
Wow. Cool!
@Sam1911 said:
I wonder if I could carve a water stop lip in the shaft that would keep the water from running back on you? I have a friend with a very long wood lathe. That might be the ticket.
A Greenland paddle doesn’t have a shaft like a Euro; it has a loom. During the forward stroke, the entire blade of the GP is submerged. Hand position on the loom is dynamic (depending on conditions); for the forward stroke it’s held where the loom meets the shoulder but there are situations where a GP paddler’s hands will move across the entirety of the loom. Adding something or carving out part of the loom not only will be ineffective, but an impediment.
http://qajaqrolls.com/2014/07/the-perfect-greenland-paddle.html
The drip rings on my Werner paddle work pretty well and not much water gets in the cockpit on those days I don’t wear a spray skirt. Unless I’m doing a stroke which places the paddle vertical. Gravity rules.
Ok, now that I am personally fascinated with the idea of Greenland paddles, and learning how to make and use them, I have to admit that I don’t know if that’s going to work for my boy. Sure could do it, but then I have to teach him a new stroke that I don’t understand myself yet. Might be just awesome, but while I’m getting all that together I probably need to put a paddle in his hands that he can just use the way he’s accustomed.
I’d like to figure out the best way to cut down our existing 2-piece Al paddles, but at first go it was more complicated than I expected.
@Sam1911 said:
I’d like to figure out the best way to cut down our existing 2-piece Al paddles, but at first go it was more complicated than I expected.
Well, I’ve never done this but how about judicious use of a heat gun to remove the blades from the shaft, trim the ends and then epoxy the blades back on?
I’ve seen a couple ways of going about it, and that’s one of my two plans.
I’ve read that it’s possible to cut the shaft with the inner connector in it, cut the stub of the outer shaft off of the connector carefully, and then epoxy the connector into the newly shortened shaft. I’m not certain. The receiving section of shaft seems to have something like a flotation core inside which wouldn’t let the connector insert much deeper if I cut that side.
Removing the blades and cutting the outboard ends might be the safer way.
Sigh, or just go buy another $40 paddle. Lol. I like to tinker, though.
You don’t have to teach anyone to use a GP,esp a beginner. The paddle will do the teaching for a basic forward stroke.
Ok. I probably need to look into some vids of people using Greenland paddles. I was trying to picture this sliding stroke and I think I’ve got it, but it seems fundamentally different from using a modern bladed paddle. I’ll look around more.
Thanks!
Wow! Cool. That’s a lot to think about. I can see how it would become natural feeling after a few weeks, as he suggests there.
@Sam1911 said:
Wow! Cool. That’s a lot to think about. I can see how it would become natural feeling after a few weeks, as he suggests there.
It feels odd at first, but using it takes care of that. With the exception holding it canted and a longer blade to submerge, nothing else changes in the forward stroke (rotation, rotation, rotation). 
BTW, that was written by Greg Stamer who has impressive creds and posts here occasionally.
8 year-old can absolutely keep up, but he needs quality kid equipment, and it’s going to cost more than a Wal-mart boat. Get him the right boat and he’ll paddle circles around you in your 10-foot sit-upons.
The Current Designs Raven is the best I’ve found for a sea kayak at this point, for kids between 60 and 110 pounds.
The Widerness Systems Tsunami SP is also good - more of a transitional rec boat.
I was not pleased with the EpiSea. Strange design, Ridiculous pointy ends, very deep at the cockpit, which is the opposite of what you want for a kid. (It seemed like a kayak designed by someone who had once seen a cartoon picture of a greenland kayak in some kid’s book.) I bought one used, and sold it almost immediately.
Acadia scout is also a bit too deep in the cockpit, in my opinion, but definitely less weird than the EpiSea. If your 8-year-old is on the taller end, it might be a decent option. 23 inches is pretty wide for a kid boat though.
While boat selection is important, I think if you want kids to enjoy kayaking you need to be ready to tow whenever they want you to. Get yourself a waist-mounted tow belt. Otherwise you risk turning your kid off of kayaking if he feels like it’s a forced march.
That Raven does look nice, as does the Tsunami! A couple feet shorter than the Epi, but the storage hatches are nice. $1,100 seems the going rate. Have to keep that on the list of boats to grab if anyone has one for sale around here.
I am coming around on the idea of towing. I don’t want to encourage them NOT to build up their strength and stamina, but I sure don’t want to make it less than fun for anyone. I keep a tow line in my boat and probably will start to use it.
I did get his paddle cut down very nicely. I took the most out of it I could, cutting a hair more than 5" from each side of the joint and refitting the ferrule. Went from 220 cm. to 194. Hope we’ll get a chance to see how that works for him soon!
Nate, you mention cockpit height and I’ve seen that commented on elsewhere. This is an issue I don’t understand very well, so if you could explain, I’d appreciate it!
I had to sit in several rec boats before I found one that I thought I could live with, legs-wise. (I’m about 6’-2" and 240 lbs.) Everything I tried seemed to have no room at all for my legs and if I bent my knees at all to try to use the foot rests, my shins dug in to the cockpits terribly. Now I haven’t tried a touring/sea boat myself so maybe they’re just different.
Obviously my guy who’s 60 lbs and only 4’-5" tall doesn’t need the space I do, but all of the touring boats, and most of the SOF or strip kits I’ve seen appear to have not much space for knees. How is that supposed to work, exactly? It seems to me if legs are kept flat/straight all the time, you end up with circulation or nerve discomfort. Is there a calculation for knee height and cockpit depth that would explain this better?
My understanding is that “cockpit height” is synonymous with “depth” or “deck height”.
The CD Sirocco pictured above has a depth of 13.25" which is fairly generous. Low volume (LV) kayak designs typically are more like 12" or less. I’m smaller than you at 6’ 0" and 195lbs and my size 10 feet just fit okay in a 12" depth kayak. If your feet are much larger then you should probably look for a high volume (HV) boat.
But, you mention " Everything I tried seemed to have no room at all for my legs and if I bent my knees at all to try to use the foot rests, my shins dug in to the cockpits terribly." Well, your legs should always be bent with your knees splayed in all but a racing kayak or surfski. It’s not a totally natural position but you’ll get used to it. To have proper control you really need to have the 5 points (feet, knees and seat) in solid contact with the boat, especially in more difficult conditions.
Just piling on with skin on frame kayak durability. My dad and I built a SOF kit Folbot back in the early 70’s. Well I mostly handed him tools. We dragged that thing to the water over rocks, sticks what have you literally hundreds of times over the years at our lake house without any damage to the skin. It was over 25 years before it became unusable and that was because we stored it outdoors without protection and the frame began to rot. And when we decided to scuttle it, the hardest part was cutting through the skin. We had to go back to the house to get a chef’s knife to cut through. Had that boat been stored indoors, or at least elevated on a rack instead of on the ground, it would probably still be in fine shape today.
And I suspect today’s skins are a lot more durable than ones made 40+ years ago, with modern materials .
Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Museum of Natural History’s “Polar World” exhibit has a number of native qajaqs and paddles, displayed exactly as collected from the field. All of their paddles have several layers of narrow strips of cloth rag wrapped and knotted around halfway between the loom and the tips. I presume that is to break the path of drips flowing down the shaft. I have yet to test this out on my own GP but now that I’m reminded of it I’ll fish some cotton strips out of my rag bag and try it out on my next outing.
My Greenland replica SOF has a lot of leg and knee space. Though the back deck is so low it barely shows above the water, the bow ahead of the cockpit is higher and spacious. Skin on frames are generally built to accommodate the body proportions of the paddler. They can easily be modified during the build. This is the model that mine was based upon (though it has a larger, standard keyhole cockpit):
http://www.capefalconkayak.com/1935sisimuit.html
And here is the boat itself:
