Creating a Kayak Paddle Leash, never loose your paddle again!

So there I was minding my own business driving home from the store sipping on my Polar Pop and jamming to Conway Twitty on the FM Radio when I saw it! A plain and boring yellow kayak sitting on a box in someone's front yard with a sign on it. At first I though nothing of it, I live in a waterfront community everybody has kayaks and this one was nothing special. Then I read the sign "$50"! So I turned around and drive by the house slowly this time looking it over. One more u-turn and I am creeping by and someone comes out of the house and waves at me, drat I have been caught! So I stop and talk to "previous" owner for a few minutes, she just has one too many kayaks and even offers to throw in a paddle with it for $50. We load the yak into the back of my 4runner and I head home the proud new owner of a rather plain yellow kayak!

So on to the Instructable! In the theme of keeping this kayak cheap I have decided to make some accessories for it. The first one being a paddle leash. The kayak already had a bow line with a brass clip on it so I figures I just needed a way to attach the clip to the paddle, that is what I am making here.

So let's talk about what you need to make one of these, here is a list of what I used:
Sewing Machine and Thread
Nylon webbing/straps
Adhesive backed velcro
Grommet and installation tools
Scissors

Note in the pictures I am using a walking foot sewing machine, I call it PacMan because of the loud munching noise it makes as it gobbles up material. I am using a Blue V92 Dabond Polyester thread because it is what I had. This project can easily be done with a medium to heavy duty home machine and a spool of heavy poly thread.

The straps, velcro, and grommet set are items I have bought at garage sales over the years so they were very cheap. If you have to buy them Home Depot sells a grommet kit that is not too expensive.

So now let's go to the next step and see how to make this.

Remove these ads by Signing Up

Step 1: Getting Started, installing the grommet

The first thing we are going to do is install the grommet.

Take about a 12" piece of nylon webbing and fold it in half. Mark about 1" back from the fold and sew a line there. This will create a tab in the middle of the strap to install your grommet. See the pictures about how to install the grommet, basically you punch a hole and then "set" the grommet with the die and set.

At this point you will have a strap with a grommet installed on a tab in the middle, now we are ready to start sewing!