Doug wrote: >>>>>Finally, being either blasted onto a lee shore or perhaps the less desirable - - blown out to sea - are scenarios for both of which I have experienced in extremis and are reasons I prefer a 60 degree feather with a paddle length of at least 7 feet that allows me to really dig or pry in a sustained fashion for my muscle type when my hands are asymmetrically placed from centre shaft or dealing with an off-angle sustained gusts in already high winds. I`m sure there are advantages to a short paddle length here too, but one thing is for sure, my paddle combination and length (so far) has seen through some of the worst predicaments imaginable.<<<<<<<< I can't argue with you about paddle length because 215 to 220 is the range I also choose (7 feet is 213.3cm) to use although I'm considerably taller than Doug and have longer arms. I probably sold 90% of the paddles we sold in the 220cm length. Maybe a little longer feeling for small and shorter paddlers but they are lower down in the boat and need to reach more over it to reach the water so there need a little more room between the blades. But you seem to be saying that you are using paddles on the long side when back in the 1980 nearly all sea kayak paddles sold were about 8 feet long (244cm). Most of the paddles I sold had only 17" long blades (standard Collmer/Lightning sea kayak paddle). I'm the guy who talked Bob Collmer into making his lightweight and strong WW paddle design into a lightweight paddle for sea kayakers using his same molds(but trimming the result so the blades were asymetrical and encouraged putting lots of oval on the shafts). It took me many years of hounding Hank Hayes (Lightning Paddles--he purchase the kayak paddle designs from Bob when Bob wanted to re-retire as his side business was becoming a full-time business) to get him to finally make a new ovalling mold to make the ovalled area of the shafts a lot longer so folks could have an ovalled shaft even when shiffting their hands around a lot. I liked the longer shaft (that shorter blades provided) so the paddler could make his paddle longer during a stroke by shifting his hands to one side when that was beneficial. I also liked them because one didn't have to bury the paddle blade so deep to fully immerse it. That allowed one of the benefits of a longer paddle without having to paddle in high gear all the time. I'm also responsible for getting Hank to pigment the black graphite blades so they would be more visible to other boaters even thought it made the blades look kind of mottled and salt and peppery and didn't look as nice as the gelcoated (old vacuum-bagged Werners). I encouraged customers to go with uglier but more lightweight and functional rather than pretty and pretty heavy. Boy we sold a lot of Lightning Graphite paddles. Actually they sold them selves and Cam would put a little Mariner Kayaks decal on each one so those folks who tried their friends new paddle would know where they were available. Many customers told us how much trouble they had getting their paddle back from one of these testers. Each paddle out there sold several more for us all on its own. I also advised Greg Barton when he was designing his original Epic sea kayak paddle, did some prototype testing for him and offered some suggestions for changes that became part of the final design. One of my suggestions was having a long area of oval. Greg built that oval into the shaft during its construction so the oval went al the way to the blade. I thought that was a great way to do that because it eliminated the stress riser that occurs when the oval retuens to round before the blades on a shaft where the oval is molded into an existing round shaft. Another was to cut away the lower shoulder of the blade more to enable it to clear the kayak better. When Werner first started using the blue Skypoleshaft I complained to Werner Jr. that the two-piece joints were too loose and the joint too short so they could wear out too easy. So if you've have ever had a problem taking a two-piece button Werner paddle apart you can blame me. I complained loudly when Werner started only ovalling one side of their shaft (the feather hand side). Maybe I wasn't the only one complaining because they soon went back to letting both hands feel where they were on the shaft. I also kept trying to get them to lighten up their paddles (as they weighed about 1/2 pound more than Lightning's--using the same shaft material). They were always worried they were going to get them back broken if they did that, but very few paddle ever broke in even extreme use. Later Werner adopted the same two sided mold technology Lightning was using and pretty much matched them in paddle weights. I see Robson has a couple of the loger blade Lightning models still in production but it doesn't look that they are making the short blade Standard Lightning I was selling and liked a lot better than the longer blade versions. Does anybody know where Hank Hayes went? *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. 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