Pool Noodle uses?

[Guest]

Yes the noodles really saved the day!

Boatman disappeared while i was strapping things to the ladder and the reappeared a second later holding a bright pink pool noodle, which he then disected into bar pads to protect the strips from the sharp edges of the aluminum ladder!

I wonder what percentage of paddlers have pool noodles or pieces thereof in their shops.

Hollow cored pool noodles are useful for all sorts of things. I have pieces cut to length and slit for different functions on the tripping truck, including holding the screen in place on the front sliding window, but the handiest paddling use is stuffed into my floppy topped mukluks to air them out post trip.

Other uses?

 

[jefffski]

We use them to protect the canoe on land. My partner grabs the pool noodle, gets out of the canoe near shore, places the noodle on the shore and then hauls the canoe up onto the pool noodle.

 

[southcove]

Last I saw of mine, they were cut to fit around the top of my heavy duty wood carry all box, which is shortly headed down to the mason dixon line to pick up my son from college...dishes, pans, other implements of kitchen destruction, etc go in there and then no worries about scuffing in the back of the van or wear on the poly finished trim of the box.

 

[flyingbison]

I have a section of one cut to fit over the aluminum thwart that is too close to the back of the seat in my Wenonah Wilderness ... I also use a piece to slip over the blade of my bow saw.

 

[yknpdlr]

Slit and cut to fit over gunwales of C2 and C4 canoes to pad and protect carrier's shoulders during portaging.

Also use them with a thin wood dowel inserted as a stiffener to make a custom fitted home-made spray cover on a Hornbeck canoe. Works great to shed water in big waves:

 

[Guest]

I put a slit section on the front crossmember of my solo canoe seat for a hasty carrying yoke

 

[yellowcanoe]

really good ideas.. I have only used them to pad out a sharp edged swim ladder.The swim ladder is easier to dismount from canoe to ladder. The floating dock is too high.. And I'm not about to invest lots of money into a lower floating dock that attaches to the neighborhood dock system. That is designed for motor boats.

I have seen them as cheap wave deflectors in the Kenduskeag race. Anything cheap that saves a possible swamp goes.Usually done in combination with duct tape end spray covers..

Could be useful for gunwale priers.

 

[flyingbison]

Sometimes I use a pool noodle to help load my canoe on top of the car ... open one of the front doors, place a slit section of pool noodle on the top edge of the door frame, prop one end of the canoe on that, and easily lift the other end onto the rack.

 

[BWCA66]

I've found that my wood gunnels turn the color of the noodles if I use them on my carrying rack.

 

[Guest]

They come in two diameters, I use the fat ones on my seat.

 

[Odyssey]

I never realized there were so many uses for the pool noodle besides car top carrying. Now I wish I'd never given mine away as I need one in the yard. My old sheet metal shed at the bottom of the garden is missing it's doors, and with the low doorway I keep scraping my head going in. (How many times must this happen before I remember to duck?) A pool noodle could protect my noodle from that. Thanks for the heads up on the colour transference thing. Only a question now which neon colour I want for the top of my forehead, and of course which diameter; a small one or a fat one. The fat one seems appropriate.

 

[Guest]

My old sheet metal shed at the bottom of the garden is missing it's doors, and with the low doorway I keep scraping my head going in. (How many times must this happen before I remember to duck?).

Only a question now which neon colour I want for the top of my forehead, and of course which diameter; a small one or a fat one. The fat one seems appropriate.

How many times? Speaking from experience, how many times you got?

There is an open front firewood building with a sloping roofline at the Tortoise Reserve. The first roof beam at the open entrance is above head height, and you step up into the shed just past it. The devious second beam inside is several inches short of 6 feet off the floor, and it is kinda dark once you step into the shed.

I dang near knocked myself unconscious on that second beam more than once before I stuck a thick pool noodle across the length of it. A neon orange pool noodle. I still hit my head on it, but now it does not hurt as much.

Trust me, a fat one will hurt less when you bump your head.

Caulked inside the noodle, with a couple nails sunk it the foam on the backside, so I can replace it in a few years. Pool noodle foam goes crumbly faster than minicel, even faster than some split foam pipe insulation, and I expect to replace it in a few years. I would guess pool noodles are some kind of ethafoam, they degrade and crumble like ethafoam.

The original owner of the Klepper Kamarade I rebuilt had installed lengths of pool noodle foam under the cockpit coming as floatation. Under the edges, so not a lot of UV exposure. They were crusty brittle and loosed a shower of noodle dust at the slightest touch. Fortunately DougD removed most of them before I got the boat. Being Doug he probably kept some.

I am 99 percent packed for a trip, and doing the usual day before thing where I stick small bits of why not gear in the truck. I just tucked in a few short pieces of scrap pool noodle.

I bet they get used. And couple short pieces of split pool noodle to be kept in the tripping truck kit would be handy, and perhaps oft bequeathed.

 

[Chip]

To keep the camel who has it's nose in the tent out, use pool noodles.

 

[yellowcanoe]

LOL.. Chip that is scary.. Looks like a guillotine ready. but its neck is already in the windows grasp so its throttled. My neighbors put their kayaks inside the van and the bows are aimed right at their heads... I think they need to wear a halo of pool noodle to avoid injury.