laminated
No reason for a laminated paddle to be heavier because it’s laminated. It’s the choice of wood that makes it heavy, use light weight woods and it’ll be light.
Bill H.
About that laminating…
What do you mean by turn 90 degrees? Seems like 180 is going to be the minimum.
Canoedancing gave me a plank of rough sawed northern white cedar. I think it was 5/4 or a little less, so not really thick enough to cut a blank. I ripped it into 1.5" strips, planed it enough to be smooth, and glued the strips together. I flipped ends of every other piece.
One drawback of flipping the strips was that the grain reversals from one strip to the next caused the plane to gouge at some points. If you flip the boards, how do you avoid planing against the grain?
Made a paddle that I am very happy with–my favorite, though it is a bit soft (flexie). Northern white is even lighter than western red cedar.
~~Chip
My reason for laminating
is to make the most of the wood I was able to buy. A 2x6 ripped to enough width for a single stick paddle produces enough waste for an additional laminated paddle. Good verticle grain WRC is hard to find in Florida, so I salvage every scrap. Next time I am going to try some harder wood for the blade edges. Maybe some maple that I have scrounged. Aside from the obvious advantages, there is a lot of satisfaction in making your own GP, all for about $20. It takes me 6 -8 hours from start to finish, but I’m sure others are much faster.
What’s the toughest wood for edges?
I have a paddle I built as a two piecer. I was told it would need to be hardwood at the ferrule, so the center portion of the paddle is ash. The rest is cedar, but it still came out to be the heaviest paddle I have, around 3 lbs. Maybe this winter I’ll shave a half pound off it, because it is also the stiffest paddle I have, and I think it will be strong enough even if I shave it down.
But reading these posts, it occurs to me that if the order of the wood is reversed, cedar center and hardwood “wings”, I could make a paddle that was still lite, but much tougher at the edges. One hears “rock maple”. Is it so called because it’s hard? Or is oak the standby for tough wood?
~~Chip
Roy, 40 ounces. I suppose I would be
willing to tolerate a little more weight for a great feeling paddle. To me this sounds like 4-6 ounces for a max of 46oz, but there had better be a good reason as my paddle at 40oz is about where I am comfortable. I also like the soft shoulder that Kris put on for me at my request. Not shoulderless, and not standard shouldered, but just enough to give tactile feedback defining the end of the loom. I epoxy coat the the first few inches of the tips and oil the paddle once per year. If I could get my hands on one of your 2pc. paddles, I think I would be willing to tolerate quite a few changes. 
Bill
Four reasons to laminate anything
1. Strength. 2. Stability (no warping) 3. Wood availability (able to make complex shapes or long ones from short wood. 4. Ability to mix woods for specific characteristics.
I have GPs both laminated and solid. My lams are way stronger and never gain much weight. I think it’s less work to laminate up a blank and carve it rather than saw and hack away a lot of wood from a large 2 x 4.
Sugar maple (“rock”) is good for
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abrasion resistance. It is close-grained, dense and the heaviest of maples. It works well with sharp tools, but it doesn't lend itself to steam-bending like ash or hickory. There are many varieties of maple available. Be careful of what's called "hard maple". White oak would be a better choice than red oak for durability, but again, it doesn't bend well.
I'd think you'd rather put a thin edge of hardwood around the blades as opposed to adding a lot of extra weight and planing wide pieces of hard maple or oak is slow going.
a reason not to laminate
The one piece can be oil finished or unfinished. Even laminated single blades are left with no finish or an oil finish at the top grip. I think nothing else provides for an easy grip for long wet miles than a smooth wood surface that is not finish or just have oil. Varnish or epoxy are too slippery. Gloves for grip will shred your hands in a couple days. It’s better that you go bare handed and build the nice calluses that last for long days.
Nystrom’s talking about re-sawing
a flat-sawn board by running it through the saw, typically standing on its narrower edge to cut it in half, and then laying those halves flat on their wide sides and gluing them together book-matched. In effect, making a quarter-sawn or rift-sawn blank. This assumes that the thickness of the re-sawn halves is adequate for the finished loom.
You’ve got the right idea…
…but you have to run the board through the table saw lying on its WIDE side, to get two, roughly square pieces that you can turn 90 degrees and glue together.
Oak works fine…
…as does ash, mahogany or pretty much any straight-grained hardwood. You don’t need anything exotic unless you’re using it for the looks.
Huh. I use my band saw for re-sawing.
I assumed you meant starting with a larger-dimension plank to end up with a single longitudinal glue joint. This would all be so much clearer with pictures!
What would you recommend to help w/ Chip’s grain reversal?
Speaking up for Mitchells
I have a Horizon, one of the ones with parallel laminations. Have never weighed it, but iy feels comfy to me.
Some of the older Mitchells with the walnut veneer over the blade that I have hefted seem A) heavy, and B) rather clunky. I believe the newest models are quite nice.
Jim
Hi Bill
Yes around 40 oz is about my favorite weight too (this is also close to the weight that most Sitka Spruce paddles end up, and most laminated WRC paddles too)
I do have one 45 oz paddle that I use. it’s my heavy lay up for surf. it’s also 3 7/8 inches wide with a 21 inch loom (it’s kind of a speciality paddle) This particular paddle is 86 inches long with ( a 4 piece paddle) with a set of 3 inch wide blades that interchange with the wide blades and makes it into a 89 1/2 inch paddle.
with the 3 inch blades on it, it weighs close to the 40 oz mark, but with the wide blades it comes in at 45 oz.
Kind of a fun paddle. I got a few others that have interchangiable blade parts but most all the others I target around 38 to 42 oz.
I’ve made paddles as light as 20 oz, but rather use something with a little more weight.
after all…Greenland paddles have their weight distributed through the entire paddle and not like a euro where all the weight is out at the ends…with euro’s I like them light.
Best Wishes
Roy
at least I don’t have the quantities like Harvey. (I don’t think so anyway)
Guess
Henry must have one of the fiberglass paddles that Superior used to offer. (I’ve always seen Henry with a wood paddle)
They have a nice weight and work very nicely
I don’t have any of the the glass models to weigh…maybe Henry will “Weigh” in on this one:)
Best Wishes
Roy
When
making paddles out of WRC, the paddles do tend to be 28 to 32 oz…not bad, but I like a little more.(purely a personal preference)
That’s why we make our own:)
Best Wishes
Roy
Thats a tough one
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The first thing you need is VERY sharp and VERY well-tuned planes/spokeshaves, if that's what you use for paddle making. Higher angle planes reduce tearout, as does a tight mouth. With block planes and other bevel-up planes, you can resharpen the blade at a higher angle, which may help. If your tools have adjustable mouths, set them for a very fine cut, then adjust the mouth as tight as possible, while still allowing the shavings to feed easily. Another key is to have a very flat sole in front of the mouth, as that's what holds the wood surface down as the blade shaves it.
If the grain is really bad and simply cannot be planed without tearout, use Microplanes or other rasps for roughing out the shape, then sand until it looks like a paddle. Sanding is a pain, but it works no matter what the grain orientation is.
laminated and oil
Again, no reason you can’t oil finish a laminated paddle. The glue is waterproof, or should be, otherwise how you finish it is up to you.
I too prefer tung oil finishes on my GPs.
Bill H.
Jay, how do you finish your . . .
laminated paddles? Epoxy? Or can you simply oil them and that’s enough, they won’t delaminate?
G in NC
It’s not critical
Any finish that prevents the wood from absorbing a lot of water will also prevent the issues that can occur with differential swelling and contracting of different woods. Oils will work, as will varnish and oil/varnish blends (my personal preference).
You can go the epoxy route if you want, but it’s not necessary. The only thing I use epoxy for is coating the tips for improved durability. If you’re going to laminate hardwood tips on your paddle, you can pass on the epoxy. For that matter, if you don’t mind your tips getting chewed up, you don’t need to reinforce them.