FW: Boats, Oars and Rowing
danch...@aol.com
Rowing buddies----Following is a pretty cool article. Hope you enjoy it! Dan
Some Things Learned and Unlearned on the Subject
Our lapstrake tender, a Walter Simmons “Sunshine” design, with her “daily driver” oars during a cruise this summer. Marty Loken photo
Before uttering a word, let’s acknowledge that one of my heroes, the late Capt. Pete Culler, authored a fine book by the same title—Boats, Oars & Rowing. So we aren’t trying to intrude on Capt. Pete’s territory with today’s headline, but we’ve been meaning to write something on the general subject.
Yesterday morning was a reminder, since between November windstorms I rowed RAVEN’s 10.5’ lapstrake tender 4 miles from our liveaboard slip to the nearest launch ramp, to haul the skiff out for winter months. While rowing in the early-morning calm I had a minor realization: The finest spoon-blade oars we own—which I decided to use instead of the heavier “daily drivers” normally enjoyed when cruising—weren’t noticeably better when pulling the weighty rowing boat against a mild current.
While we normally (make that always) assume our beautiful flyweight spruce spoons are the weapon of choice, I learned yesterday that the old, clunkier spruce spoon-blades have leathers in a better position on the shafts…and with a bit more heft they seem to carry better through rowing strokes—maybe especially when pushing against a slight current or adverse wind. Or when the boat’s bottom is fouled with some weed growth at the end of a long season…certainly the case yesterday.
In the world of small boats we all savor, our main propulsion may come from sails or motors when the wind dies, but most of our under-20’ small craft are equipped with oars for auxiliary power…or paddles, or sweeps for sculling in fewer cases.
These are the kinds of boats many of us own, on display at a recent Pocket Yacht Palooza in Port Townsend. Most have sails, but every single boat in the photo is also armed with oars. So while many of us might prefer sailing, winds around here are fluky and unreliable during the season, so choosing the right oars can be important. Marty Loken photo
I’ve been rowing my whole life, so yesterday’s end-of-season experience got me thinking about the many kinds of oars I’ve used; how a lot of recreational rowing suffered with the advent of inflatables and efficient small kicker motors, and how rowing may now be making a small comeback.
The oars aren’t highly visible in this ancient photo, but that’s me at the water’s edge with my Dad, about to go for a row out to fishing grounds aboard one of the many skiffs he built in the basement. Yes, I had a great childhood on the water, and around someone who could build most anything he needed in life—from the homes we lived in to a variety of small boats.
Rowing, of course, has been around for countless centuries, from ancient Egyptian galleys on the Nile, to Roman warships on the Mediterranean—and then to the use of oars as important auxiliary means by explorers and warriors from northern Europe, who mostly sailed but relied on long sweeps when needed.
We think of modern oars and oar-blade designs as recent creations, but when it comes to recreational rowing and crew racing, outriggers were commonly used almost 200 years ago in England; sliding seats appeared at least 150 years back, and asymmetrical hatchet-style blades—which today rule in collegiate rowing—appeared in the U.S. in the early 1880s…invented or at least made promising by Michael Davis of Portland, Maine, who also invented the still-popular offset Davis Oarlock.
This was a four-oared shell of Bowdoin College in 1881, showing off their then-revolutionary hatchet-shaped oar blades, which did well at the time but were replaced by tulip-shaped spoon-blade sculls in the world of collegiate rowing. Only since 1991 have carbon-fiber hatchet blades made a comeback—now thoroughly dominating crew racing. The original hatchet blades were pioneered by Michael Davis (Davis Oarlocks fame), who came up with a variety of unique rowing hardware.
Our personal history on the water began with logs and driftwood boards for paddles, progressing to heavy ash oars sold by Sears Roebuck in the 1940s. Our first rowing boats were Grandpa’s boxy cedar-planked pram, and some of the first plywood skiffs my Dad built in the basement. (They were soon followed by my own first basement creations, which started to emerge at age 10.)
In childhood, we knew nothing about oar design, and assumed all oars were the same—heavy old manufactured things, with leathers and straight, thick, unbreakable blades. They got us around, allowing us to row up the beach to the magical, mysterious backwaters of Little Manzanita Bay, so the oars were just great.
After surviving teenage years of waterski racing, outboard marathons on Puget Sound and runabout restorations, at age 30 we had our first experience with a “real” traditional small craft, a 1946-built 16’ Poulsbo Boat—a curvaceous cedar beauty designed for recreational salmon fishing in Puget Sound and powered by a little 3hp Wisconsin air-cooled marine engine. But—and this was important in my education—also propelled by oars. Because the Poulsbo Boat was a relatively heavy displacement hull, I learned that the best oars were longer than anything I’d experienced (9’), and with lengthy straight blades. And for the first time ever, I was exposed to the light weight, beauty and strength of clear Sitka Spruce oars.
Since those early days of building and restoring wooden rowboats and vintage sailing craft, I’ve had experiences with all manner of oars and oar-blade designs. Traditional flat-blade oars both long and short, and oars of ash, spruce, cedar and fir, then short and longer spoon-blade oars mostly made of spruce. And over the past decade some adventures building and using recreational rowing boats with sliding seats, outriggers and both spruce and carbon-fiber oars—many with tulip-shaped spoon-blade oars.
The first sliding-seat boat I built was this 19’ prototype for the Colin Angus-designed sleep-aboard RowCruiser, almost ten years ago. With outriggers and 10’ Concept 2 carbon-fiber spoon-blade oars, I loved the hull design but discovered that my old torn-rotator shoulders preferred fixed seats, shorter oars and a more relaxed pace on the water. Marty Loken photo
What I found, just personally, was that my old torn-rotator shoulders were happier with 8’ spruce oars than with sliding seats, outriggers and 10’ sculls. (The older I get, the happier I am perched on a gel pad and rowing—never racing—with oars that are nicely balanced and mostly made of real wood, whether featuring spoon or straight blades. And even more recently, building a beamy, ship-like 14’ gunter yawl, I’m committed to the lesson that longer narrow and straight-bladed oars will be best for the hefty yawl, along with a lengthy sweep for sculling the beast in tight marina spaces. More on that boat in coming months.)
I still love and enjoy using beautiful and well-balanced spoons made by Shaw & Tenney and Grapeview Point Boat Works here in the Northwest, but deeper into retirement I’m regaining my appreciation for traditional straight blades, sculling notches and maybe even thole pins. (Please call the men with nets if my backward trend reverts to logs with sticks for paddles.)
While most of us love fancy, lightweight spoon-blade oars for rowing, there’s nothing wrong with a simple pair of dinghy oars, as designer John Welsford demonstrates aboard his 6’ 3” pram, SCRAPS. (These are the kinds of oars and tiny boats many of us grew up with, and they bring just as much satisfaction decades later.)
The best thing I’ve seen in the world of paddling and rowing is kids—some really little kids—out there learning to row dinghies or paddle SUPs and kayaks. No engines, no iPhones, just rowing, paddling and having an unforgettably great time. Just the way we did in our first years on the water.
Josh Colvin’s young daughter, Winnie, rows Dad around Boat Haven Marina aboard a Portage Pram. Marty Loken photo
Hopefully, today’s young rowers and paddlers will save boating from its march toward a big-boat train wreck that seems imminent and might soon trigger a much-needed trend back toward simplicity, environmental sanity and more pure fun on the water. Yes, in small boats, with some of them actually being rowed.
Here’s hoping…
DIFFERENT STROKES:
Photos of Boats, Oars and Rowing
A side-by-side comparison of hatchet blades on carbon-fiber shafts (white) and a beautiful pair of spoon-blade spruce oars from Grapeview Point Boat Works in western Washington. Hatchet blades dominate collegiate rowing these days, having replaced tulip-shaped spoons 30 years ago. Hatchets, sometimes called cleavers, are asymmetrical, and are often used by folks with recreational rowing shells. Spoon-blade oars, meanwhile, seem to dominate in the world of traditional rowing boats, along with old-fashioned but effective standard (or straight) blades. Marty Loken photo
A rack of mostly-straight-blade oars at the Northwest Maritime Center in Port Townend. Some have thicker spines for strength; others are simply long, flat blades. These are great in longer lengths when rowing larger, heavier hulls. Marty Loken photo
A lot of small-boat owners prefer spruce oars with long and slender straight blades, like these on a handsome rowing-sailing craft that pulled up on the beach in Port Townsend. Marty Loken photo
These nice spruce oars have fairly shallow spoon blades—stronger looking than some, and with rounded tips instead of the sometimes-seen straight tips. Sally Gadow photo
These gorgeous spoon-blade oars have reinforced straight tips, octagonal looms for a bit of counterbalance weight, and nice leathers. Sally Gadow photo
Creative fun with some spoon-blade oars, seen aboard a 15’ Oughtred-designed Whilly Boat at the Pocket Yacht Palooza, in Port Townsend. Marty Loken photo
Super lightweight spoon-blade oars with reinforced spines, aboard a small lapstrake skiff. Sally Gadow photo
Our glued-lapstrake 10.5’ tender is towed behind when cruising…shown with our “daily driver” spruce spoon-blade oars made by Barkley Sound Oar & Paddle of Vancouver Island, which unfortunately is no longer in business. These are slightly heavier and perhaps stronger than the finer, ultralight spruce spoons we reserve for special occasions, made by Grapeview Point Boat Works…but we still love rowing with the Barkley Sound spoons. Marty Loken photo
I rowed this Adirondack Guideboat across the inner bay to a beach on Dungeness Spit, using traditional guideboat oars that cannot be feathered, since they’re fixed firmly in vertical-blade position with oarlock pins through the square looms. (Heavier square looms are traditional and help achieve better oar balance.) Marty Loken photo
This is when kids should start learning to row—as boat designer-builder Colin Angus demonstrates with his first-born son. The carbon-fiber spoon-blade oars were made by Croker.
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Chris Ringdahl
On Nov 13, 2023, at 1:55 PM, danchilson via fcrowing <fcro...@googlegroups.com> wrote:Rowing buddies----Following is a pretty cool article. Hope you enjoy it! Dan <image001.jpg>
Some Things Learned and Unlearned on the Subject
Boats, Oars and Rowing
Some Things Learned and Unlearned on the Subject
Before uttering a word, let’s acknowledge that one of my heroes, the late Capt. Pete Culler, authored a fine book by the same title—Boats, Oars & Rowing. So we aren’t trying to intrude on Capt. Pete’s territory with today’s headline, but we’ve been meaning to write something on the general subject.
Yesterday morning was a reminder, since between November windstorms I rowed RAVEN’s 10.5’ lapstrake tender 4 miles from our liveaboard slip to the nearest launch ramp, to haul the skiff out for winter months. While rowing in the early-morning calm I had a minor realization: The finest spoon-blade oars we own—which I decided to use instead of the heavier “daily drivers” normally enjoyed when cruising—weren’t noticeably better when pulling the weighty rowing boat against a mild current.
While we normally (make that always) assume our beautiful flyweight spruce spoons are the weapon of choice, I learned yesterday that the old, clunkier spruce spoon-blades have leathers in a better position on the shafts…and with a bit more heft they seem to carry better through rowing strokes—maybe especially when pushing against a slight current or adverse wind. Or when the boat’s bottom is fouled with some weed growth at the end of a long season…certainly the case yesterday.
In the world of small boats we all savor, our main propulsion may come from sails or motors when the wind dies, but most of our under-20’ small craft are equipped with oars for auxiliary power…or paddles, or sweeps for sculling in fewer cases.
I’ve been rowing my whole life, so yesterday’s end-of-season experience got me thinking about the many kinds of oars I’ve used; how a lot of recreational rowing suffered with the advent of inflatables and efficient small kicker motors, and how rowing may now be making a small comeback.
Rowing, of course, has been around for countless centuries, from ancient Egyptian galleys on the Nile, to Roman warships on the Mediterranean—and then to the use of oars as important auxiliary means by explorers and warriors from northern Europe, who mostly sailed but relied on long sweeps when needed.
We think of modern oars and oar-blade designs as recent creations, but when it comes to recreational rowing and crew racing, outriggers were commonly used almost 200 years ago in England; sliding seats appeared at least 150 years back, and asymmetrical hatchet-style blades—which today rule in collegiate rowing—appeared in the U.S. in the early 1880s…invented or at least made promising by Michael Davis of Portland, Maine, who also invented the still-popular offset Davis Oarlock.
Our personal history on the water began with logs and driftwood boards for paddles, progressing to heavy ash oars sold by Sears Roebuck in the 1940s. Our first rowing boats were Grandpa’s boxy cedar-planked pram, and some of the first plywood skiffs my Dad built in the basement. (They were soon followed by my own first basement creations, which started to emerge at age 10.)
In childhood, we knew nothing about oar design, and assumed all oars were the same—heavy old manufactured things, with leathers and straight, thick, unbreakable blades. They got us around, allowing us to row up the beach to the magical, mysterious backwaters of Little Manzanita Bay, so the oars were just great.
After surviving teenage years of waterski racing, outboard marathons on Puget Sound and runabout restorations, at age 30 we had our first experience with a “real” traditional small craft, a 1946-built 16’ Poulsbo Boat—a curvaceous cedar beauty designed for recreational salmon fishing in Puget Sound and powered by a little 3hp Wisconsin air-cooled marine engine. But—and this was important in my education—also propelled by oars. Because the Poulsbo Boat was a relatively heavy displacement hull, I learned that the best oars were longer than anything I’d experienced (9’), and with lengthy straight blades. And for the first time ever, I was exposed to the light weight, beauty and strength of clear Sitka Spruce oars.
Since those early days of building and restoring wooden rowboats and vintage sailing craft, I’ve had experiences with all manner of oars and oar-blade designs. Traditional flat-blade oars both long and short, and oars of ash, spruce, cedar and fir, then short and longer spoon-blade oars mostly made of spruce. And over the past decade some adventures building and using recreational rowing boats with sliding seats, outriggers and both spruce and carbon-fiber oars—many with tulip-shaped spoon-blade oars.
What I found, just personally, was that my old torn-rotator shoulders were happier with 8’ spruce oars than with sliding seats, outriggers and 10’ sculls. (The older I get, the happier I am perched on a gel pad and rowing—never racing—with oars that are nicely balanced and mostly made of real wood, whether featuring spoon or straight blades. And even more recently, building a beamy, ship-like 14’ gunter yawl, I’m committed to the lesson that longer narrow and straight-bladed oars will be best for the hefty yawl, along with a lengthy sweep for sculling the beast in tight marina spaces. More on that boat in coming months.)
I still love and enjoy using beautiful and well-balanced spoons made by Shaw & Tenney and Grapeview Point Boat Works here in the Northwest, but deeper into retirement I’m regaining my appreciation for traditional straight blades, sculling notches and maybe even thole pins. (Please call the men with nets if my backward trend reverts to logs with sticks for paddles.)
The best thing I’ve seen in the world of paddling and rowing is kids—some really little kids—out there learning to row dinghies or paddle SUPs and kayaks. No engines, no iPhones, just rowing, paddling and having an unforgettably great time. Just the way we did in our first years on the water.
Hopefully, today’s young rowers and paddlers will save boating from its march toward a big-boat train wreck that seems imminent and might soon trigger a much-needed trend back toward simplicity, environmental sanity and more pure fun on the water. Yes, in small boats, with some of them actually being rowed.
Here’s hoping…
DIFFERENT STROKES:
Photos of Boats, Oars and Rowing
•SCA•
POLL
On my primary small boat....
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If you enjoy Small Craft Advisor , share it with your friends and earn rewards when they subscribe.
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