Pacific Designs & Paddle Drip

I’m 5’ 11"; I’ve got a Dirigo kayak and a 230cm T1 paddle from Pacific Designs.



I was out last night for the first time without a sprayskirt and I was shocked at the amount of water that the paddle held and dumped into the boat on each stroke. I’d say by the end of an hour of paddling, I had maybe a 1/2 gallon of water in the boat.



I was watching the paddle - the water seemed to collect & hold onto the back of the paddle.



Is it the paddle? Is this something that I’m doing? – using a high angle stroke with a low angle paddle… but, I really tried changing things up and trying different things. It didn’t seem to make a difference.

Get drip rings

It has 'em.
.

Might be related to your cadence…
If you are just cruising so to speak with a slower cadence, this sort of gives the water that is ‘stuck’ on the blades to run down.

Definately lilly-dipping.
(At least I think that’s the term that GK used.)



I was really poking around. It just really seemed like an excessive amount of water. I’ll play around some more and see how it goes.



With how it is right now, my poor kid is going to be quite wet. :wink:

One thing that I am sure is contributing
to it is that excessively long paddle that you are using.

Watch how much of your blade is going underwater.

If much more than an inch of shaft where it meets the blade is going under water, your paddle is too long and you are bringing up a lot of unnecessary water.

I would think that at your height, a 220 would be plenty long.



Just my thoughts!

cheers,

JackL

I agree.
I was out paddling a few times this weekend (different boat & paddle)- out of habit, I grabbed a 230. A little later, I went out again and this time, I grabbed a 220. The 220 was much better.



I think I’m going to talk to the guy at Pacific Designs and get his recommendation on cutting the paddle down.



Thanks all for responding.