Knee Pad Foam Experiment
Posted: Sun Apr 17, 2011 6:01 pm
Years ago when I was outfitting a lot of canoes as a side business, I would cruise the local orthotic and prosthetic lab for scraps of a really dense closed cell foam called Pelite. This was before the foam was sold on the internet. It comes in a variety of thicknesses and densities(they do the durometer scale) up to 13mm(1/2"), but I haven't researched prices or how much you'd have to buy to get a wholesale outlet to sell to you over the internet. One place I found with decent prices was www.jmsplastics.com If your a closed cell foam junkie like me, you could spend a couple hours researching all the foams they sell on that site.
I remember Kent Ford showing us how he outfitted his C-1 way back when and his cradling of the knee was just the ticket for my situation. He would take a really stiff closed cell foam(maybe was Pelite) and cut a recess in it where that really bony part of the knee is towards the rear of the pad and sculpt it for an exact fit taking all the pressure off that "high" spot in the knee that would otherwise bear all the weight. Then it was covered with a thinner neoprene foam for traction/comfort and the really stiff foam supported the rest of the contact area.
Obviously a slalom C-1 outfitting differs from open canoe and conversion boat set ups, but the concept of cradling the knee has always stuck with me. The Pelite foam is heat mold-able at like 200-250 F, so it could have hip padding and other uses for conversions too I wold think. The Pelite I used to get from the lab was 10mm thick and white, but maybe other colors are available. I use a 6" tall minicell trapezoidal-shaped block(roughly 60 degree angles for the medial side of the knee/thigh) glued to the floor to keep my knees apart in my Outrage X, so this cradling works perfectly for that. If your boat had multiple users of differing sizes, it likely wouldn't work as well.
I've also seen a couple of gel based portable canoe knee pads, but they seemed awful heavy and would definitely need lateral support to be effective and I couldn't figure out a was to secure them into the floor of the boat with glue. At $30/pr, that was a tad pricey too.
Any feedback on this?
That's my story and I'm stickin' to it.
YMMV
DM&FS
I remember Kent Ford showing us how he outfitted his C-1 way back when and his cradling of the knee was just the ticket for my situation. He would take a really stiff closed cell foam(maybe was Pelite) and cut a recess in it where that really bony part of the knee is towards the rear of the pad and sculpt it for an exact fit taking all the pressure off that "high" spot in the knee that would otherwise bear all the weight. Then it was covered with a thinner neoprene foam for traction/comfort and the really stiff foam supported the rest of the contact area.
Obviously a slalom C-1 outfitting differs from open canoe and conversion boat set ups, but the concept of cradling the knee has always stuck with me. The Pelite foam is heat mold-able at like 200-250 F, so it could have hip padding and other uses for conversions too I wold think. The Pelite I used to get from the lab was 10mm thick and white, but maybe other colors are available. I use a 6" tall minicell trapezoidal-shaped block(roughly 60 degree angles for the medial side of the knee/thigh) glued to the floor to keep my knees apart in my Outrage X, so this cradling works perfectly for that. If your boat had multiple users of differing sizes, it likely wouldn't work as well.
I've also seen a couple of gel based portable canoe knee pads, but they seemed awful heavy and would definitely need lateral support to be effective and I couldn't figure out a was to secure them into the floor of the boat with glue. At $30/pr, that was a tad pricey too.
Any feedback on this?
That's my story and I'm stickin' to it.
YMMV
DM&FS
Fortunately, I have a rotary grinder, so my technique is to literally grind the internal shape out of a block (very carefully!). I leave a little extra material, then use a heat gun to melt/meld the material into a surface skin. By the time I'm done, I can get the boney knob on my knee within 1/4" of the hull without ever contacting it. The pads typically last a few years before they're warn out.