New oars!

Last night I finished the 10-foot pair of oars I've been working on for the past five weeks or so. Gluing up the blanks was a bit of a pain, so I dilly dallied around, putting off the parts I didn't like. After the glue up, the project went quickly.

I enjoy working with draw knives and spokeshaves and soon I was ankle deep in shavings. My Stanley No. 40 scrub plane and my Stanley No. 3 small smooth plane came in handy as well. Both these planes are more than 100 years old and work every bit as well now as they did when they were made. I suspect the 10-inch draw knife and the two spokeshaves are at least close to the same age, but Stanley planes are much easier to date because of the changes in the Stanley logo and the innovations the company made to their planes.

I used Douglas fir because I couldn't find spruce of the right size. As I was finishing up this pair a friend suggested that Port Orford cedar would be another good wood for oars, and I have no doubt he's right, but that's another difficult wood to find. The oars turned out heavier than I wanted, but they seem to be well balanced.

I used a pair of Norwegian oars that are more than 50 years old as my guide. These are the most beautiful set of oars I've ever seen. I just wish they were long enough, but, alas, they are only eight feet long.

I will see how well they work tomorrow on a 10-mile row from Elk City to Toledo, Ore., on the Yaquina River. My friend, Scott, who loaned me his 9-foot oars, is coming with me. This is a Western Oregon Messabouts/Traditional Small Craft Association event. The weather is not shaping up all that great - looks like we will have wind and rain - but the tide will be in our favor. A spring tide should give us about a two-and-a-half knot push. Afterwards we are eating BBQ at Pigfeathers, a great little restaurant across from the Toledo City Docks.

Ravn's Rowing Report

Since launching Ravn Aug. 21 I've taken her rowing four times and I'm happy to report that, true to her Viking heritage, she handles like a dream under oars. There's no question that she has some weight when you take that first pull, but the extra glide seems to more than make up for it. She also just brushes off small waves.

The other thing I'm really pleased about is how stable she is. While rowing alone I used all of my 250 pounds to try and push the gunwale down at the middle of the boat. I didn't even get my knuckles wet. On another occasion I took my wife, daughter and her two kids rowing with me. At one point during the voyage four of the five of us were standing and moving about the boat; it didn't feel at all tippy. The grandkids had a ball running around on the boat.

When you look at the boat from the end it is narrow on the waterline, which makes it such a good pulling boat. She quickly gets beamier, however, as the boat heels or as the load increases, making her more stable. This bodes well for her being able to stand up under the press of sail.

I rowed across the lake near my home last Saturday when the wind was blowing about 15 knots creating some nasty wind chop. She didn't ship a drop of water and behaved herself like a lady, tracking straight and true. I decided to stop rowing and see what she would do. She slowly came to a stop and then clocked head to wind. I think that is the payoff for having a long, fairly deep (for a rowboat) keel.

While at the Toledo Wooden Boat Show, a fellow Coot loaned me two binders loaded with information on Scandinavian boats. It included a monograph on the Hardanger Faering by Owen H. Wicksteed prepared for the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, London, copyright 1978. The author's family owned Kari, a Hardanger faering built in 1892. (I believe that this is the boat on which Paul Fisher based his Kari 2.) The oars used on the Kari were 10 feet, four inches long.

All the rowing I've done so far has been with a pair of 9-foot oars I borrowed from a friend. They move Ravn along just fine, but I feel the need for a little more leverage. I'm at work on a pair of 10-foot oars modeled after a pair of 8-foot Norwegian-made oars that are about 50 years old. They are beautifully made and have a nice shape. I'm excited to finish them and try them out.

One concern I had about Ravn was that she would be more difficult to launch and tow than my 14-foot Chamberlain dory. I need not have worried; even though Ravn is more than three times as heavy and has a deeper draft, it is not noticeably more difficult to launch, recover or tow than my little dory was.