Knee Lever Paddles

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Jif
Posts: 86
Joined: Thu Nov 08, 2012 12:54 pm
Location: Scotland

Knee Lever Paddles

Post by Jif »

I recently bought a Carter U12 and found the knee levers were hurting my knees, so decided to make some paddles. I couldn't find anything here in a search but found an old thread on the pedal steel forum here,

http://steelguitarforum.com/Forum5/HTML/007980.html

Decided to have a go at making something similar, so I took the basic idea and adapted the sizes to suit the Carter style knee levers. I wanted to bolt them on from the back so decided to use Aluminium rectangular tube instead of Aluminium channel. I found some 25mm X 16mm tube which was almost a perfect fit for the width of the Carter knee lever and also bought a piece of 2" X 1/8th" Aluminium flat bar for the paddles. I didn't like the idea of using rivets as it would be difficult to get the inside of the channel flush onto the knee lever, so I used JB Weld epoxy to glue the channel to the plate.

I have 5 knee levers inc. a vertical, so decided to make paddles for all five. The 4 horizontal paddles @ 120mm x 2" and the vertical @ 100mm x 2". (forgive my mixture of metric and imperial sizes!).

Took photos of the build and thought I'd share the results with you all here. I made a trial paddle first, so the photos show the other 4 being built.

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Here are the materials used.

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All pieces cut.
Last edited by Jif on Wed Feb 12, 2014 8:25 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Jif
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Location: Scotland

Re: Knee Lever Paddles

Post by Jif »

Next I cut the corners on the plate,

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Corners marked for cut.

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Used scrap wood and double sided tape to make cutting easier.

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All corners cut.
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Jif
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Joined: Thu Nov 08, 2012 12:54 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: Knee Lever Paddles

Post by Jif »

Next, cut the holes in the tubing for tapping. I decided on using 8mm bolts, so drilled the holes to 7mm for tapping. Put in 4 holes in each piece, (apart from vertical), although I'll only use 2 bolts on each piece, to allow for versatility.

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Drilled holes on my new bench drill.

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All holes drilled and tapped at 8mm.
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Jif
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Location: Scotland

Re: Knee Lever Paddles

Post by Jif »

Next, glue pieces together. I found a good tip on another forum which suggested applying the JB Weld with a piece of wet & dry as soon as the oxide layer has been removed from the aluminium. The resulting join has proved to be very strong.

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Glue on pieces.

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Clamped together in vice.

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Excess glued cleaned off with alcohol and clamped to dry overnight.
Last edited by Jif on Wed Feb 12, 2014 8:25 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Jif
Posts: 86
Joined: Thu Nov 08, 2012 12:54 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: Knee Lever Paddles

Post by Jif »

All paddles glued.

Image

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Jif
Posts: 86
Joined: Thu Nov 08, 2012 12:54 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: Knee Lever Paddles

Post by Jif »

Needed to cut 10 bolts down to about 10mm, this left enough room for a lock washer to be used when tightened.

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Used wood cut to 10mm width to make cutting easier.

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Nice clean cut.

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All bolts cut.
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Jif
Posts: 86
Joined: Thu Nov 08, 2012 12:54 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: Knee Lever Paddles

Post by Jif »

Thought it might be an idea to put some foam on the paddles to soften them. I used 2mm Eva Foam, usually used in crafts. I used a spray glue to fix the foam onto the metal, sprayed onto scrap wood then placed paddle face onto the glue, then placed each paddle onto a piece of foam taped onto a piece of hardboard.

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Glued onto foam.

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Then clamped another piece of hardboard on top and left to dry overnight.

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Then cut out paddles using craft knife.
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Jif
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Joined: Thu Nov 08, 2012 12:54 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: Knee Lever Paddles

Post by Jif »

Finally fitted paddles to Carter and adjusted knee lever positions to suit.

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Verdict, I'm very happy with the result and it's made playing a lot easier. Also my knees are not aching so much after a session :D
maxi19
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Location: Milton Keynes, England

Re: Knee Lever Paddles

Post by maxi19 »

I like it Geoff. :) :)
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Jif
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Joined: Thu Nov 08, 2012 12:54 pm
Location: Scotland

Re: Knee Lever Paddles

Post by Jif »

Thanks Ron, it's the first thing I've built in my attic workshop which I just fInished setting up in December, so I'm pleased that everything worked out more or less as planned.

It's a bit cold up there at the moment, I'm hoping to get started on my lap build once the weather gets better.
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