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The current design for enabling people to paddle outriggers with the use of one arm had a little draw back in that the paddle kept rotating. Without a second hand on top of the paddle there was no way the paddle could control the angle at which the blade dug in to the watter.
Funny little aside, at the time talking about the problem I shot an idea out that instead of hanging the paddle from a flexible pole by a bungee, fix it via a bolt to the pole. I forgot all about that and then over the winter set about with the design describe below. All happy with the prototype I proudly presented to the team at the first camp this year only to find they'd implemented the bolt-pole idea and it works a treat. That said, we're going to continue developing the adaptive handle as its already built.
Funny little aside, at the time talking about the problem I shot an idea out that instead of hanging the paddle from a flexible pole by a bungee, fix it via a bolt to the pole. I forgot all about that and then over the winter set about with the design describe below. All happy with the prototype I proudly presented to the team at the first camp this year only to find they'd implemented the bolt-pole idea and it works a treat. That said, we're going to continue developing the adaptive handle as its already built.
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In the sketch below you can see the two basic components of the prototype. Firstly the user places their forearm in the horizontal section and secures with neoprene bands. The paddle is attached to the prototype above and below the hand.
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flipping, "huli" is always a possibility and the iako, the wooden pieces, made of very strong wood, can knock able body paddlers out, and draw blood on the skull, which can be very bad in shark waters.
every paddler has different abilities and limitations,so i give a lot of credit and applause to you for working on solutions. avoided skin damage is of extreme importance especially in salt water. Too bad so many different groups and i notice they all want the whole kingdom. maybe not in mass, is mike hyondi sp?? still paddling up there, i used to have good times with his people. blackburne challenge and such
The atheletes come with various abilities. Quite often not having full range of movement at the waist. With outrigger's the top arm is always locked square over the paddle. The paddle is driven with a digging motion, lower back providing the energy. Remove/reduce the ability to twist at the waist and there is less of a need to allow leverage from the top arm.
Its not unknown for the canoes to tip, I wanted something that the athelete could easily release.
That all said I will talk to the experts at http://www.accessports.org/participate/index.html and see if there are more higher functioning atheletes that could handle a shoulder brace and use it as a lever efficiently.
Thank you very much for your feedback, I'll keep you posted if I work on it.
A canoeist using only one arm may be able to benefit from using a paddle as a 3rd class lever using a rig as I've drawn (below). A shoulder brace would attach via a ball and socket joint to an arm's length of tubing. This would in turn be connected via hinge joint to the top of the paddle.
The canoeist's hand would then be free to grip the paddle in the correct location, just above the blade. I believe the one hand should be able to adequately control the position and rotation of the paddle, as well as provide greater power per stroke.
I hope this is a helpful take on your original idea!