this time of year i leave my duffle bag with all my gear as well as my paddles in the car.just in case i can run to the water quickly after work. my question is i have this nice werner fiberglass paddle. will the heat hurt it? i leave the windows closed for the most part so it can get super hot.
not sure about fiberglass . . .
I don’t believe there’s a problem for glass, but all that heat will definitely do a number on anything rubber. Wet suit, Drysuit, booties? Those things definitely lose life in a hot car.
Doubt it’ll hurt anything
But werner probably knows better than me.
What color is your car? Is there any shade? Can you crack a window?
If nothing else, just take it inside with you – they are great conversation starters.
jim
Black paddles
I would not leave a black paddle in the direct sun inside a car. It can get really hot if you live someplace with real sun. Some paddles are put together with a throat pushed into the shaft tubing. I was told once that if the paddle gets very hot the air expands enough to crack the epoxy holding the throat in the tube and the paddle will leak and take on water. I kind of doubt you could develop enough air pressure (P=nRT/V) with a 40 or 50 degree temperature gradient but maybe it does happen.
Store the paddle in the cockpit…
…of your boat instead of inside the car. Even with a cover over it, it should stay considerably cooler than the inside of the car.
paddle storage
I have a Werner Cyprus (black paddle). When not in use it’s in the house.
When it’s travelling it’s in a well designed padded paddle bag which I got as prototype from Technomadic Designs. This proto holds two paddles. Their single paddle bag has been out a couple of years. Another great small American company w. innovative products.
A good paddlebag can be made from the covers for the ubiquitous folding butterfly chairs.
Just get some 1/8" minicell in sheet form, and make a sleever suitable for each blade - quick, easy, relatively cheap. Protect your paddle!
in the boat
is a great idea.that’s always in the shade! sometimes the simple things just escape us!
My paddles, …
A lot of them high end ones as well as cheap ones , both canoe and kayak, stay in a inclosed vehicle for about three months every year down in the Florida Keys, and none have ever had any ill affects from the heat.
I am sure the temperature in there is a hundred or more during much of the daytime hours.
cheers,
jackL
I think MythBusters
found that a black car can get up to 140 deg F and a white car only got to 1110 or 120 deg F.
A paddle bag will let you bring it inside if there’s really no shade nearby. One corner of our parking lot at work has trees, so I back the truck and trailer w/kayaks into the shade on the days I paddle. Huge difference in temps with just a little shade.
A simple duffel bag would make it easy to bring inside without many stares. Or maybe get a hard gun case if you want some stares.
jim
My truck has black seats
Black seat belts. Black plastic dash and vents, A radio with XM. A CD player. Black rear dash.
Never had anything warp or get gnarly after parking it in the summer 24/7 for 6 years.
My carbon-over-wood slalom paddles
have suffered no harm when inside the car, even with sun on the blades.
Werner paddles are made with high quality epoxy, and I believe it is a heat-set epoxy. I would not expect problems with them.
However, I do have a custom kayak paddle with Double Dutch carbon blades, and these blades did overheat and swell when inside the car in the sun. I was able to fix them by drilling holes and injecting epoxy into the swollen core.
Don’t burn your hands
I don’t know if the heat will damage your paddles, but strong direct sunlight on black paddle shafts can burn your hands. If the shaft is black metal (what I had on a cheap spare paddle once upon a time), it’s even worse than with black composite.
High altitude and dry air probably causes this effect more strongly where I live than in low or coastal areas, so YMMV.
I keep my paddles covered when they’re in the vehicle.
Jack, my paddle
when not being used has stayed in the trunk of my car 12 months/year in Florida for almost 9 years without ill effect.
In Florida…
I have had cassette tapes melt from the heat that builds inside a sealed car in high summer (that was the end of my Danish lessons)!
When outside temps are in the 90’s I bring my glass/carbon paddles inside. If I kayak before work, I carry the paddles via a paddle-bag (I have a North Water bag).
Greg Stamer
Gear Shift Knob in Tucson
– Last Updated: May-27-09 1:21 AM EST –
The first summer I lived in Tucson, I got off work and it was about 114, I jumped in my truck and shifted in reverse and the black gear shift knob came off in my hand and gave me second degree burns with blisters.
In Tuscon the dashboards on cars often deform and crack from the heat of the summer sun. Cassette tapes turn into odd shaped little packages of destroyed matter, not that anyone knows what they are anymore. Electrical tape in your tool kit turns into liquid.
For fun and excitement my son discovered that you take a magnifying glass and black paper and if you focused the sun on the black paper it would instantly burst into flame in the noon day son in Tucson.
Intensified glare no joke
I just heard about someone’s house burning because some glass object concentrated the sun’s rays enough to focus it into a firestarter.