Greetings All,
Flipping through damaged cargo auctions and came across a Norvoca paddle…however it is in the “damaged cargo” auction - 11" from one end there is a large crack - is this repairable? If so how?
Picture of damage: http://pictures.cargolargo.com/pictures/_1101/1100569/1100568386.jpg
Thanks,
Bob
My guess is yes
– Last Updated: Oct-20-13 8:16 AM EST –
But the repair might add a bit of disbalance, one blade being heavier... Sand, patch, spray paint/clear coat it. And it will have a bit of a bump in an area where it might be noticeable in the water if you are really sensitive...
If the other side of the paddle opposite to the crack is also damaged, you might need a sleeve and repair both sides.
Edit: I've cut in half and rejoined the shaft of my AT2 Flexi whitewater paddle, so a similar structural patch - no issues, but there is a visible bump. Mine is in the middle of the shaft so it does not matter, but yours would be on the blade, near the area where a nice foill shape would be good to maintain ...
On another forum…
…the owner of Novorca already explained that he had examined this paddle and determined that it was not practical to repair it. After getting that information “straight from the horse’s mouth”, why are you asking the same question here?
If the goal is to learn some things and gain some experience repairing composites, perhaps it’s worth the effort to repair the paddle, but you’re not likely to end up with something that you’ll actually want to use.
Don’t buy it to try it. If you already
owned it, it might be worth a try, but why sink money into a doubtful purchase, not knowing if you can fix it?
What I can see in that closeup picture does not make me confident that you’d be trying to fix a quality paddle. That blue cracked stuff looks like plastic.
If you were working on a pure carbon paddle like one of mine, a repair might be possible with more carbon cloth, maybe a bit of Kevlar, and epoxy. Carbon and Kevlar are both light cloths, much lighter than glass. But my own experience fixing a greenstick fracture in a wooden paddle shaft is that a ragged crack like that in that kayak paddle, a crack in plastic, is going to tend to break even a carbon cloth repair. And if the repair is made too thick to break, it will break somewhere else.
This is from Ron at Novorca…
Hi Bob,
I had the chance to inspect this paddle when it was returned to me. I determined that it was not cost effective to repair it.
That doesn’t mean it couldn’t be repaired but the damage is significant. The damage in the photo is as bad as it looks; that
crack goes through the CF into the core. There is no simple way to fix that paddle (“simple” being subjective). I would sink
at least $150 and 30 hours into it if I had to repair it properly. A couple things: the repair would require the finished be removed and redone.
The finish is a custom 2 tone fade paint job (blue pearl to white pearl). The other thing I am thinking: roughly 200 grams of material
are going to be on that end of the paddle to cover the crack and surrounding area.
Maybe 1/2 a roll of Gorilla tape warped around it would get you back home if you were out on an island somewhere and something like this happened to the paddle.
But I’ve never seen a UPS truck out on lake Superior so I am doubtful that something like this would happen.
I’m not going to say it “can’t” be repaired, but it would most likely be off balance and aesthetically challenged.
If you’re serious about fixing it up - give me a call and I’ll see if I can scrape together a fix-it kit with the correct materials you’ll need.
Best Regards,
Ron Steinwall
Novorca LLC
Thanks everyone
Thanks everyone.
Sorry to double post (on Qajaqusa.org) - Just wanted to broaden out potential responses. I didn’t think the original builder would chime in 
I decided to pass on it, my epoxy skills are not that great, and it was a bit too big for me…
Thanks again!,
Bob