I have a Lendal Kinetic 4-piece touring paddle. Yesterday I noticed I could rotate the paddle blade even with the tightening mechanism tight. I removed the blade from the shaft and found that the small tube that is inserted into the blade and contains the tightening mechanism has become unglued. The adhesive has become white and chalky and has no adhesive properties anymore. This is true of both blades. So I need to repair this. What adhesive do you recommend? How should I clean the old adhesive off? Anything to watch out for in doing this repair?
For a permanent repair - epoxy
– Last Updated: Jun-06-10 7:32 PM EST –
I would think epixy should work. Clean the old stuff carefully so that you do not damage the shaft or the paddle blade inside. Scrape it off with a flat blade knife and may be sandpaper on your finger to reach in. Then just use 30 minute epoxy that most hardware stores sell.
It's really odd that both of your blades should come lose like that! I have the same paddle (in the CC layup) that I have not used much yet and have had no issues with it - I guess I need to watch that area...
That was what I was thinking
It turns out that I was mistaken about one blade. It seems firm. I took the other apart by rotating and pulling and have been carefully removing the adhesive (epoxy?) with a knife and will sand it afterward. I have some West System epoxy left over from a past project and will try that as the adhesive. I still wish I understood why this blade came undone. According to the stickers on the paddle it was made in Scotland, which would be pre-Johnson Outdoors. But it may be that the adhesive was applied unevenly (there were spots that had little or no adhesive). Anyway, I really like the paddle and hope this works.
Should work
Try not to sand into the carbon - just enough to remove the lose old adhesive, so that you do not enlarge the gap unnecessarily. If the gap is too big anyway, you can probably thicken the epoxy so that you get a good fill.
It goes without saying to make sure you align with the rest of the shaft -
On my paddle one blade or may be the hole for the button is off by a couple of degrees. As a result mine does not get perfect 0 degree feather, unless I have the button opening in such position that it is almost hidden. One of these days I’ll lenghten the slit by a millimeter or so to fix that…
West G-flex is even better than
West 105/205 for such jobs. But I would use the leftover West if I didn’t have the G-flex around.
Probably the Scots used some glue made of sheep intestines.
Sticker means nothing.
The blades were made in the USA by Abbenhouse and had a Scotland sticker on them! JOI subsequently changed this to “crafted in Scotland” after hours of meetings. Both are disingenuous moves in my mind.
Gle is probably “expired” methacrylate.
"Crafted in Scotland"
Ah, that explains a bit. I was trying to rectify the stickers on the Lendal carbon paddle I recently purchased with the ‘Johnson Outdoors’ and Maine address printed on the packaging.
Very interesting
In any event the g-flex seems to have worked.