Oars

[redtailseven]

I'm sorry but my photo files are too large to upload and I don't know how to fix that. I'm just slightly more than computer semi-literate. It works, at least so far. It feels absolutely solid On this lake, its a great relief to know I can get home without a motor--I am less adept at the care and feeding of small engines than computers. I have personally caused the demise of close to a dozen of the smelly old things over the last 35 years.

[GreenLake]

If you google "fee picture resize" you find all sorts of free utilities that you can use for that purpose. Many are really easy to use, but I can't recommend any particular one - perhaps others can. (I have a professional suite, so I'm using that, naturally, even though it's harder to use for "just" resizing).

[redtailseven]

I have finally posted two views of the oarlocks in my photo album. Now that I have the ability to do so I'll post some of the boat soon.

[pbobbitt]

Any obvious reason why I couldn't just mount top mounted oarlock sockets on the top surface of the coaming?

[GreenLake]

Here's link to the picture of the oarlocks mentioned above



As you can see, this places the oarlocks as far outboard as possible, which would allow you to use somewhat longer oars that are likely more efficient.

My take, having rowed a friend's DSII across a marina once: the DS hull is not easily driven, making it awkward for both paddle and oars. I would rate either fine for limited distances.

Now the oars I was using were optimized for easy stowage, not optimized for best proportions and leverage. One of the problems is that correctly proportioned oars are longer than the bottom of the cockpit. It may be possible to carry them on deck, with their blades forward of the shrouds.

[pbobbitt]

Interestingly, I used a couple of lengths of rope to fabricate a reasonable oarlock to find a pretty reasonable place to position a set of 8' oars. (I built a CLC N.E. dory a few years ago, own an 18' Swampscott and have logged many, many miles rowing)... I certainly wouldn't row it across the Chesapeake, but I'm confident I could pull it a mile or two.

I ended up using surface mounts sourced from Duckworks.

The objective here is to find a way back to the club when the wind is blowing 0-3, not try a novel new entrant in the Blackburn challenge.

[pbobbitt]

I may be giving them a whirl tomorrow when the wind dies on the river I'll let you know how they hold up.

[pbobbitt]

Turns out the open space of the cockpit is just over 8' long, so 8' oars fit pretty well on floor of the cockpit... You slide the blade into that little drainage lip between the thwart, and the cockpit floor, they stay out of the way, mostly. I'm thinking if I mount a padeye in the middle of the thwart, I can lash them to the thwart.

[GreenLake]

I've rowed a boat that was equipped the way you describe, and with the oars stored that way. The owner had constructed some kind of platform to lay across the CB trunk to use as a rowing seat. It was certainly functional and worked for getting across a marina, but I was surprised how much work it was. But, while I didn't try a direct comparison at the moment, I believe paddling would have been more strenuous.

[pbobbitt]

Yeah, rowing with this setup isn't going to be for everyone.

I've rowed that 18' Swampscott 10 miles by myself, same oars. The thing is a beast, it weighs 200-300 pounds, the beam is about a foot less thant the DS...

I'm going out in about 30 minutes using new set up.

[pbobbitt]

So... mostly this was fact-finding, but I managed to row back in 2-5 kt breeze, maybe 400 yards, around an island.

The biggest issues:

1) You gotta pull the rudder or truss it out of the water. It isn't enough to just lash it to the centerline.
2) You gotta work the centerboard to trim the hull to adjust for weight displacement in trimming the hull. Just an inch or two of centerboard (from none) kept the boat from weathervaning into the wind. As the relative wind direction changed, you had to keep trimming the centerboard to keep from having to kill yourself correcting the boat.

If anyone's interested: I started off by just lashing the tiller, then worked my way up to just trussing it out of the water. In the future, I'll just pull the thing as part of the transition from sail to oar.

[pbobbitt]

All in all, i was able to keep full control of the boat in a light breeze. I think I"m going to have to go longer on the oars, and switch oarlocks from horns, to closed circles.

[GreenLake]

Looks like your fact-finding missing was a great success.

[pbobbitt]

Yeah, in the end, it's like any other boat I've rowed: it should glide through the water, each stroke will push it foward, and it should glide straight. The trick is to keep the 'hull trimmed.' In some of the boats I've rowed, this is as simple as sliding your but 1-2 inches fore or aft. That swampscott, for example requires that I keep two 5 gallon buckets of water in the boat sitting on the stern thwart to keep it trimmed properly to the wind, otherwise, it too will just weathervane such that the stern of the boat is facing the wind in even the lightest breeze. This force is takes an tremendous effort to correct.

As a friend once noted of the swampscott: it was designed to be rowed with 1000 bounds of fish in it... My guess has always been if the silly thing has consumed half it's freeboard, the trim would be way, way easier to maintain.

[GreenLake]

I've measured effect of fore-aft trim on speed using a small motor. I found that sitting on deck right behind the mast was fastest. However, sitting on a seat across the CB should be a good approximation. With the same motor I found that I could not keep the boat on course without using the rudder, if there was significant wind present. When I experienced a broken rudder, I had to use a paddle for steering, turning the motor would turn the boat, but couldn't be controlled. I can't imagine this being all that different in rowing. (The motor used would propel the boat a bit faster than you can probably row it, but far from hull speed, so that effect from windage could be felt clearly).