Daggerboard trunk glued up and rear seat glued on

Ok my patient mates, heres some photographic evidence of my work on the boat last week before I left for self-imposed exile at work.

First, I finally got that bedamned daggerboard trunk glued up.  Somehow, I wasnt forward thinking enough, and I glassed up the daggerboard without really giving much thought to how it fit in the already made trunk.  Well, I did but discounted further planing on of the daggerboard and decided that I was done with all the planing and sanding thank-you-very-much and whatever I had, I had.

This was most unfortunate, because I few more minutes of planing would have produced a superior quality board, and it would have fit in my daggerboard case.  So then I was stuck with the project of widening my case, but only by 2-3mm at most because really, all I needed was 1-2mm.

Fortunately, I found 3mm Okoume marine plywood at Goose Bay Lumber, and cut it to fit over the framing for the trunk.  This widened the trunk appropriately.  Here is the widening sequence in pictures:

Very self-explanatory, I think.

Next, I still struggle with the hardward issues for the rudder and transom gudgeons.  I dont know how Im going to get this rudder assembly attached to the boat.  The problem is that the hole to accomodate the tiller does not have the vertical clearance required to use a gudgeon-pintle scheme, which is by far the most convenient.  I toyed around with it and thought about enlarging my tiller-hole, but my pintle arms didnt fit around the rudder cassette.  A second order of larger, more heavy-duty gudgeons for rudder and transom fit great, except not with each other, and the arms were too long for the spacer in the cassette... A rod pushed through the gudgeons would not have fit cleanly and I would have had a clunky feeling rudder, the round peg in an oval opening thing, if you can visualize that.  So I still sit, wondering how I will fix this conundrum.  Many people have done it successfully, but Im still hunting around for the best hardware.

Because of all this drama, I have delayed gluing on the rear seat.  I got tired of having it loose, and glued it on before I left.  Here, yet again, is my "Forest of Bricks" holding it all down.

And the gratuitous parting shot:

Rudder stock design 4 Mast gluing

In yet another installment of "I try to re-design the rudder stock" I have received yet another set of plans from a Goat Island Skiff builder in New York.  He has graciously supplied me with these two schematics of his own design, as a solution to removing the tiller from the rudder assembly without having to take the rudder off the transom.  It is self-explanatory:

I really like this design, it is better than mine for two reasons:  1. It maintains Mr. Storers rudder stock design and hopefully solves the structural issue that he was concerned about, 2. There is less time fiddling over the transom pulling very critical pins over water of yet-to-be-determined depth, if you get my drift.  I can remove the tiller from the safety of the cabin.  Unfortunately, I will still have a stub of tiller sticking into my domain, but I think, for now, this is the idea Im going to go with.  The great thing about the rudder stock is that it is simple and easy to construct, I can always make another.

In other news, the mast was glued in its first step today.  In the previous post, I shaped the narrow staves.  This was a workout, but I worked carefully, and Im happy with the result.  Then, off to make the spacers for the ladder frame.  I used a piece of fir that was lounging around the garage, some stud material.  I used some good parts, and cut them to fit.  The base plug meant a trip to Lowes.  This is the first wood part of the boat that was not bought at either of my two local lumber stores.  Sorry guys.  Anyway, an 8 piece of 4x4 cedar.  I thought about using fir, for a few bucks less, but I went with the rot-resistant cedar.  Its an important piece, its light, and it should be good.  The other spacers Ill goo up with epoxy and make them plastic.

Well, that was interesting how the photos lined up, but I like it!  Notice the base plug.  After a quick mock-up my lovely wife and I took one of the uncut stave stock pieces and brought it into the basement, where I can get an even floor workspace and a slightly higher temperature, better for quicker gluing.  We made sure that we could get the wood in and out of the basement two different ways, so I dont build the mast and then get it out.  I am positive I can get the mast out of the basement.

Layed out ready for the dry fit:

Sweet, I did it again, but I dont know how.  The mast is quite straight, but I decided to use one of the wide uncut staves as a backbone for gluing, that way I could ensure that the mast is straight with no wobbles.  It also gives me a good even workspace for gluing too.  I covered one stave with packing tape, and glued away:  Notice too, the hardwood runners that will be glued to the bottom of the hull, they are long ones and needed to be scarfed.

It went well.  The bricks are slightly nudging the mast into a straight position.  Youll also notice that you dont see much of the wide stave underneath this glue-up, thats because the tolerances are super tight.  I overcut my narrow staves by 1mm and it pretty much ate up all the space on the wide stave.  I briefly considered re-planing the staves, re-working the spacers, and then gluing, but my lovely wife stopped me with some business graduate degree mumbo-jumbo stuff and talked me out of it.  I might have to plane a little extra off the base to get it to fit in the mast step, and I can (with difficulty) enlarge the mast step as well if need be.

Tomorrow, gluing the wide staves and completing the box.
 

Wet on wet epoxy coating

Today I coated one side of my BHs with two coats of epoxy to seal and waterproof the wood. I used the wet-on-wet method that Storer recommends. The first coat when on quite well, I used a small cheap squeegee thing to spread it around, and a small roller held stationary to smooth it down. I kept one BH on just using the spreader, to little difference. Once the first layer got tacky I added the second layer of epoxy, again with the squeegee and then rolled smooth. The second coat went on waaaaaay smooth and took less epoxy as well. I was actually surprised at how little epoxy this whole operation took. A little goes a long way.

At this point my wife called me to join her downtown for dinner, which I happily did. I thought I would have had enough time to get back to apply coat three, but I was wrong. I came back and the epoxy had all hardened up. Some bulkheads will have to be "de-waxed" and sanded for the final coat, because I need these to be waterproofed up. Others are good to go right now with two coats because in some places it went on a little thick. So Im good in some area, not so good in others, all in all, Im not worried. I made a little more work for myself, but oh well.


Damn. Those look good.

The gluing of the buttstraps and the chinelogs yesterday still goes. The temperature is maybe around 50 deg. in the garage, so today I built a heat box with a space heater and a sheet:


Not the most efficient design, but better than nothing under the circumstances. The glue has set up, but if I press firmly I can still get a fingernail in, which is a Storer-failure. So Im not touching anything and well wait until tomorrow before I move anything.

The dreaded stem still continues to stump me, but I shall solve it by jove!

New post!

With nothing in it!

Work on the Goat Island Skiff has been temporarily stopped due to a return to work/on the road status.

I have pictures of some work I did just before I left, but they are unfortunately inaccessible at this point in time.  Stay tuned until next week!

Old tools but good ones

Tools.

I’m not really a tool freak, not a collector in the sense of lovingly restoring old woodworking hand tools and putting them on display in glass fronted shelving but I do enjoy getting my hands on old tools and bringing them back to life. When I’ve a particular little job that needs a special tool, and I can go to my shelf and pick up a tool that was designed to do that special thing, I get great satisfaction from using it.

So I watch out for the unusual as well as the standard ones that I use every day.

Junkshops, garage sales, on line auctions and occasionally a friends eagle eye all bring in treasures.

My usuals the ones that I’ll buy without thinking are the Record and Stanley number 3 or number 4 planes.  Those are tools that I use every time I go into the boatshed, and now, living on the ship with the boatshed here plus my old shop back in Hamilton still being used, I have built up a double set of tools.

I’ve now 10 of those, the reason being that when working and one wears its sharp edge off or I hit something that puts a nick in the blade, that plane goes in the shelf above and I pick up another that’s sharp and set.

To be sure, when they’re all in need of a sharpen it’s a big job, but on a wet morning when there is no one around its quite a satisfying thing to set up an assembly line with the dry grinder, the wet grinder, the two different grade waterstones and the lap, and run through them all.

I digress.

Just recently my friend Paul Mullins came across a couple of unusual tools when a neighbours shed was being cleaned out.  There was a Stanley number 67 Spokeshave, this one is designed to cut right up against an edge and could be used to tidy up a curved rebate, left or right handed. 

The number 67 spokeshave, note how the handles can be repositioned to allow it to work against a rebate, that can be done either side.  Interesting tool.

The other is a router.  No, not one of those noisy finger biting things a “real” one.  Used to be known as a “Grannys tooth”. Its a Stanley number 71 1/2,  one of a series of different sized routers that Stanley made.

It’s a hand tool, essentially a flat plate with a pair of handles and a cutter that extends below the plate, push it and it cuts away below the surface, the cutter can be set for depth so its able to gradually work away increasing the depth of the cut.

Excellent for relief carvings.

Stanley number 71 1/2 router with 1/2 in and 3/8in cutters.  I do use one of these now and again, have also the very small one which I use when carving tabletops and such.

 Note that these, like almost all Stanley tools found in New Zealand or Australia are English Stanley so there are some differences from those made in the USA.

I was thinking that I should be looking for a brass wire brush to start tidying these two treasures up, they’ve been soaking in Inox for a while now, and are ready or a cleanup before I regrind the cutting edges and flat the backs of the irons, when my very elderly uncle, a joiner by trade, gave me a Stanley number 55 combination moulding plane that he’d had since very early in his career.

Its got all the standard irons, no parts missing, it’s a real treat!

Heres the link to a page of pics.

https://www.google.co.nz/search?q=stanley+number+55+combination+plane&client=safari&rls=en&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0CCgQsARqFQoTCOSjz6yy78gCFcxVPgodnjwAQw&biw=1024&bih=776

These planes can be used to make mouldings. Look around your house at picture frames, the surrounds of windows and doors, skirting boards ceiling coves, cupboards and chests and you’ll see a huge variety of different shapes.  This plane can make all of those.  Not in one pass you understand, but by planing away part of the profile then changing the blade and the positioning of it, it then does another part of the shape.

 In its original box, this ones done quite a lot of work but all of the original parts including "the book" are there and in good order. 

 There are a lot of parts to one of these, the handle is out to the left and each of the parts to the right is a separate fence and depth gauge system, some of which have knife holders as well as scribers. 

I should have counted them, there are probably 40 different knives in the set, rounded, radius edge, beading, rebate, oogee, you name it.  Amazing tool.  Yes Ive used one, but its not something that Id use every day. This is a collectors item, will be greased up and stored, but maybe, just maybe, Ill need it to produce a moulding to match something existing someday.

Theyre slow, but if one is matching up a section no longer available off the shelf, or too big for a router bit (the electric finger biting kind not the one above) it’s a practical and useful tool.

That plus it’s a really impressive thing to show off with.

I need more shelves. 

Again.

Painting Top Coat

This is a big post.  Big as in:  Holy Baloney Batman, were getting close to the end!  Goat Island Skiff, activate!

After priming my boat, I had to leave for work.  I got home 5 days later, gave it a good smoothing sand job, and then cleaned up the dust with the shop-vac blower to vacuum to rag soaked in denatured alcohol.  The denatured alcohol was a tip mentioned on the Wooden Boat Forum-- it will help soak up and evaporate any water that had absorbed into the primer as well as clean up dust.  After that, it was time for painting.

The paint was Interlux Brightside, a one part marine paint.  Its expensive, about 40 bucks or so a quart depending on where you purchase it.  I decided to use the pricey stuff as opposed to Behr Porch Paint or Rustoleum Enamel because I figured Ive spent so much money on this boat already, I might as well use good paint on the exterior as well.  Its just a bit more anyway, and it was well worth it, as you will see.

I used a roller, which left behind little bubbles, and then "tipped-off" with a bristle brush.  I would generally roll vertically and then gently tip-off with a brush horizontally.  Then I let it dry.  The instructions recommend sanding with 320 before the second coat, but I only had 220 and used that, with little ill effect.  A second coat then was applied, and the results are spectacular.  Behold, my painted boat:

Not bad!  Check out the reflection of the towel!  It looks like gel-coat!  I am the painting man, thanks to Interlux Brightside and its easy-to-apply-million-dollar-finish qualities!

Next up, the interior, and sailing.

For the super vigilant, they will notice I still do not have rudder hardware on the stern.  This is bad news, and there will be a post devoted to rudder hardware, Duckworks (awesome), and West Marine (awful evil disgusting chain store I will never frequent again).

Let me just say this, if my boat gets finished and I dont have rudder hardward and this impedes me from sailing, I am going to freak out.

Progress! Yeah! Wet on wet stem quick dry fit!

I was home for a few days, and I buckled down and got right to it.

Day one:

First I enlarged the holes in BH2 and 3. I want more room to store my gear: oars, extra spar, etc. etc. I was able to do this neatly and cleanly with my scrolling blade that I discovered in my blade set! Yo dummy! Im much happier now with the results.

Second: I wet-on-wetted the un-wetted sides of the BHs with epoxy to encapsulate the wood. Three layers, which got it quite thick I may add. Maybe a little too thick. I used squeegees and and a brush and the roller a la Storer. I must say I wasnt impressed with the roller method, I feel like I could get a smoother surface without it-- the roller left funny little bumps. I think the thickness is just sloppiness on my part and maybe too much epoxy. Needless to say, everything will be sanded down for paint/varnish whatever I decide. Id love to do some brightwork, but I dont know if I want to do the work. I see lots of sanding in my future with the splotchy epoxy job.

That being said, epoxy got everywhere, and it was a big mess, including the undersides of my BHs, despite carefully applying tape everywhere to hold the mess. I used painting masking tape, packaging tape that would have hung lower than the BH would have prevented epoxy from curling underneath and dripping onto the BH backsides that were already done.

Day two:

Then I cut the notches for the chinelogs into the BHs. This was more difficult than I thought it was going to be. I used my nifty Japanese pull saw, and it was awesome. I paid very close attention to bevels and carefully marked the boundaries of the notches. A few mistakes were made, but nothing that cant be saved or filled with epoxy. Taking my time instead of rushing this part was worth its while.



Afterwards I FINALLY CONQUERED THE DREADED STEM! (second try)

I unfortunately did not photo-document this. This is how I did the stem:

1. Cut out a rectangular blank of the stem from my stock.

2. Draw the stem out on the blank-- triangle on top, the front edge and then on the backside, the back edges graduating from 36mm at top to 22mm at the bottom.

3. Plane down the starboard and port sides from 36mm at the top to 22mm at the bottom. At this point, looking at it either from the stern or bow, I have a trapezoid that is wider at top than at the bottom. Still rectangular.

4. Now, all that is left is to remove the material from the backside to the bow point. Using the backside 36mm-22mm edge, I planed down the material to the front pointed bow. I left the bow a little wider than a knife edge, about the width of the sharpie pen mark. Its a little tricky to get the second side because there is now no longer a flat surface to work.

5. Patience.





THEN THEN THEN

I kind-of dry fitted the hull together!!! (I was impatient, I had to see the boat for morale)

I screwed on the stem to the bow pieces, with screws through ply backing as described in the Storer plans. This is hazardous, because once the screw gets into the backing it spins around like the devil and Id have to push frantically for bite into the side of the boat or else the screw and backing ply goes zooming off the bow and then Id slam the drillbit into the side of the boat leaving a good dent. A good method is to push the screw through the backing first so a little pokes out that it can be stuck into the side by hand to hold it in position. Watch your fingertips!

So the stem went in and then I spent a while screwing around with BHs and and the transom and placing them more or less where they were supposed to go. I took some tie-down straps and cinched the stern together to get a visual idea of what the boat was looking like.



It looks like a Goat Island Skiff! Amateur Style! But a GIS, nonetheless, the curvy midsection and straight knife-like bow are telling.



HOLY SHA-MOLEY!!!

I attempted to screw in BH1 but it was about as difficult as pulling my own wisdom teeth. Sagely, I walked away when one side of BH1 ripped away from the screws holding it into the port side.

In the following picture you can see the gap between the chinelogs and BH2. Imagine BH1, which is just as bad if not worse. Its going to be a true WRASTLING nightmare to get that together, I think. Im going to re-measure my BHs, make sure they are the right size, and do some brainstorming. BH3 looks gappy, but its not bad, a little squeezing and it fits right in.



Some things I noticed: The chine logs butted up against each other in the bow next to the stem. A little bit of chisel work took care of that, giving them more room.

Also, my stem needs to be cleaned up a bit, especially the bottom portion. Maybe this will aid in screwing in BH1. As I said, I was impatient to actually see something, and Im glad I did this today.

Vogalonga Why Venetians do it standing up

The Vogalonga is a priceless opportunity to row round the Venice lagoon, passing through the islands of Murano and Burano before making triumphant progress down the Grand Canal itself, and finishing outside St Marks Square.

Participants take to the water in whats probably the widest variety of different, oar-powered craft youll ever see in one place, mostly flamoyantly dressed, and as determined to have good time as they are to take on the 30km rowing challenge.

There were just so many reasons why we kept saying "Oo, look at that one!"...

---

Event: Vogalonga
Where: Venice, Italy

Distance: 30km

Time: About 4hrs - it isnt a race!

Boat type: We were in a wide 4+, but any human-powered boat will do

Number of crews in the event: Hundreds

Event Organiser: www.vogalonga.com

---

What does Vogalonga mean?
Literally, "long row". Voga=row and longa=long, not surprisingly.

While youre at it, "Vog" rhymes with "dog" not "Vogue". Never try to sound posh when speaking Italian as you will have got the vowels wrong (and while Im at it, "Latte" rhymes with "paté" not "Art A"). Thanks for letting me get that one off my chest.

A bit of background, including "focole"
When you think of rowing in Venice, most of us, myself included, think of the expensive, black tourist gondolas, and thats it. But when you think about it, what WOULD the average Venetian do as a sport? Not many facilities for football, hard to train for a marathon when youre turning corners every 20m and falling over tourists every 10m, and race cycling is clearly right out. So its actually quite logical that Venice has a number of rowing clubs, all tucked away off the tourist track a little.

A Venetian rowing clubs fleet of "stand up" boats.
And a Filippi double.

But when I say rowing, its not as we think of it, Jim. For starters, they often dont sit down. And they face forward. Why? Well, the islands of Venice - the main one, the Lido and the outlying islands of Murano, Burano and Torcello - stand in a lagoon. A shallow lagoon. There are various dredged channels through this that allow function as roads for the motor boats, but you could stand up in most of the square meterage of water out there. However, there are plenty of rocks strewn around this area, so if youre standing up and facing forwards as you row, you can see these and avoid them. 

Which is a lot better than putting a hole in your Empacher single.

The clubs collection of "focole".

Not only do you not get to sit down in Venetian rowing, you also dont have a button to lock your blade onto the gate - and to make matters even worse, the "gate" is a rather open-plan affair, and is basically a half-circle carved out of a wooden post called a "focola". Focole often have more than one carving in them - enabling a gear change, which is a natty idea. I think I saw some, though there isnt an example here, where there was a carving on the back of the focola - for backing down.

"16 men went to row"

About the event
The Vogalonga is not a race. Prizes ARE presented but only to crew numbers randomly drawn out of a hat afterwards. And everyone gets a little medal and a poster.

Rather, its a celebration of unpowered rowing in a city where the many commercial motorboats - "vaparetto" water buses, and the elegant but expensive water taxis - throw up a heck of a lot of wash. As a result, any human-powered craft is welcome in the Vogalonga, and this ranges from 1-man plastic kayaks, to the most extraordinary and unique boats, some involving large number of standing-up oarspersons.

There were also dragon boats, outriggers, a Finnish chuchboat, and many, many I didnt begin to recognise.

What to wear?

Note the white skirts.
Not sure what the rug trailing in the water is for...

As far as we could tell, the formal kit for a Venetian rower is white trousers, a horizontally striped top, and a matching sash round the waist. Which was obviously all fine until ladies started rowing. Now, your average Italian donna can get away with skin-tight white jeans, or even hotpants in a way that we Brits, with our Anglo-Saxon skin, cant even dream of. But despite apparently embracing female members of the club (not literally, doubtless some of that goes on too, but thats not the point here), it appears that certain traditions have to be observed, so lady rowers wear short white SKIRTS. Most of these appeared to be tennis skirts,  although I saw one lady who appeared to have been unable to get to her local branch of Lillywhites before the event, and had resorted to rowing in her petticoat. Well, it was short and white. Although it also had lace round the edge.

Boats came in all colours.
Sometimes with matching oarsmen.

And what not to say to a gondola-builder
Our team of nine were fortunate to have arranged to borrow a sliding seat, offset coxed four from a tiny rowing-more-as-we-know-it club out on the Lido. It was a bit battered, but ran nicely, although the undercarriage on one seat broke as we were rowing it across to the start area the day before the event. Fortunately, the place where the boats were being stored overnight was next to a gondola-builders workshop, so I approached the master craftsman within, brandishing a 30-year old, broken rowing seat at a man who makes utterly exquisite craft, that sell for up  to E30,000 a piece, and asked him if he could help us. After considerable sighing, some glue and some clamps were produced. It was rather like Fabergé if he could just slop some paint over a hard boiled egg. But we were back in business.

Onboard refreshments being served to a canoeist.

Out on the water
With nine in our team and only five seats in the boat, I was in "crew 2", and we caught the vaparetto out to the tiny island of Burano, which was roughly the half way point, with the aim of finding somewhere we could swap over with "crew 1". We quickly identified an ideal spot along the main canal that runs through the centre of the island. A large barge was moored there, with a group of French people aboard, who were preparing mounds of sandwiches, and unpacking boxes and boxes of chicken drumsticks. As the first crews approached, they would easy, and call up their food - and drink - order. "Do vin rouge? Certainement!" "Des sandwiches?" Bien sûr!". The French would then load the victuals onto a round metal bar tray, mounted on a long pole, and pass the order out to the crew.

Compared with the "no alcohol/early night" discipline of regatta and head racing, Id been fairly amazed at the cocktail party laid on by the organisers of the Tour du Léman the night before the race, but drinks DURING the main event - this was truly continental.

Anyway, we hopped into the boat, and headed out from Burano, further across the lagoon, and then through the canal on Murano, the glass-blowing island. Then we were back into open water again, overtaking smaller craft, and being overtaken by larger ones, all of them fascinating to look at. 

Steering under the Rialto is one of the most
memorable moments of my coxing career.

Finally, we turned into the main bulk Venice, entering a canal in the North where both banks were lined by cheering crowds. We soon turned into the Grand Canal itself, and lapped up the incredible experience of rowing under the Rialto.

The event ends in a complete frenzy with well over a thousand small boats gathering in St Marks basin, where it was incredibly choppy - whilst the man-powered craft might not cause much wash, a stiff breeze, and a massive cruise liner than had come in to berth (I think theyve stopped that now) made it all pretty rocky. 

Which, of course, meant that conditions were not ideal for the obligatory salute that boats make on finishing, which is called the "alta remi" or "high oars" - you take your blade out of the gate and hold it vertical. All of you. At the same time. And in our case, VERY briefly.

The "alta remi".
Well, some of us.

Unmissable
The logistics involved in the Vogalonga a are fearsome for Brits - its a long way to drive with a boat trailer, and even then, you need a character-ful boat to do it in, or youll just feel like youve somehow got into the Stewards enclosure at Henley wearing jeans. It would detract from the experience.

But if you can overcome these, you will be rewarded with a spectacle like you have never imagined, filled with craft, costumes and colour, good humour, numerous languages, and supportive crowds. YOU will be part of the Venice that the tourists have come to see. 

But do try to avoid being photographed in your petticoat...

This boat almost certainly wasnt made to
be propelled  this way, but why not!?

Transom glued up!

Ok. Ive been off the radar for a few weeks for several reasons. Namely: Job related problems now solved, my marriage, my inadvertent cutting-off-the-tip-of-my-finger winterizing my garden which led to a giant bandage and stitches, and my work that takes me on the road. Im suposed to be on the road today, but Im not because I have a massive head cold and I think my eyeballs are going to pop out of my head. So no work for me.

About two weeks ago, I glued up the transom. Storer recommends not using screws in the transom, I think this is for aesthetic reasons. I did use screws as opposed to the nails I had been using for the BHs, primarily because I could get a slightly tighter fit. I did not use nails on the transom head-board because I wanted to maintain the visual integrity of that piece, and I was able to secure it in spot with clamps through the tiller-hole. Everything came together really nice and I am pleased with the result. I was careful to wipe away the excess, and I was sure I had gotten everything, but I didnt. I came back and found hardened drips that materialized sometime during the night and they dripped onto the stern-stern of the transom. Using a chisel to cut them off, I ended up mucho-biting into the top of the transom and took a chunk out of the ply. OH WELL. I saved the piece and will epoxy it back in.

Otherwise, I think the transom looks good!

Shaping up a set of store bought oars

OARS FOR SEI.

Lets get the jokes out of the way, the one about this being a “two oars-power cruiser”  and the one about “keeping things on board oar-derly “. Oh, and the one about the Greek Bireme that docked too close in at speed, “Dis-Oared-‘er”.

With that out of the way,  I want to show how I go about turning a pair of off the shelf machine made oars into something that I like to use.  As they come they’re robust, but very heavy and unbalanced, tip heavy so a lot of downward pressure on the handles to lift the blades on the recovery.

So to make them easier to use, more pleasant and just “nice” I cut the oversize blades down a little, shave the blades thinner with a ridge down the middle to keel them sufficiently stiff, and slim the shaft from the “leather” down to the “neck.

Oars should ideally be matched to the boat, this one being a sailing boat will have a little more resistance than a lighter and more slender boat, so needs oars that are slightly more stiff than the ones for the pure rowing boat.

They need to be practical too, which means a thicker blade and a more robust tip so I can use them to pole the boat in the shallows or push off a jetty somewhere.

The species of wood used needs to be taken into account, European Ash (Fraxinus Excelsior) used to be commonly used and is tough, resists damage and makes a reasonably good utility oar .  But its heavier than I like, and the costs more than I like to shell out for a pair of oars that I’m not going to use as the boats primary propulsion.  This is a sailing boat after all.

Spruce, (Picea Sitchencis) by comparison is much lighter and is strong for its weight but crushes very easily so an oar made from this may be easily damaged.

All that’s a bit academic though, as the ones that are available off the shelf here are stated to be “Tasman Pine”.  Good old Pinus Radiata,  actually not bad stuff for this use if chosen carefully.

Its mid range in weight for a softwood, fairly strong for its weight and if kept well coated with varnish reasonably stable.

So that’s what I’m working with today.

For a boat of this anticipated resistance to movement I prefer a slightly narrow blade, 90mm wide at the tip, 80mm wide at the neck end, 6mm thick at the edges of the blade, with a prominent ridge down the middle to stiffen it, the neck will be around 30mm through the vertical axis ( that’s in line with the blade) and full width which in this case is about 40mm at 90 deg to the blade, a fat oval section there to orientate the thickest part of the section to the load.

Tools.  Making that hollow section from the ridge down the middle of the blade out to the edges is what stops a lot of people.  I’m fortunate to have come across  a round mouthed spokeshave and as a tool “enthusiast” ( not what my wife calls me) I bought it just in case I found a use for it.

Its not rounded front to back, this one is radiused from side to side so makes a hollow. Ideal.

But there are other ways.  I”ve used the nose end of a belt sander, offered up at an angle and run along it will carve a hollow, a small angle grinder with 40 grit sandpaper on a flexible backing piece will do an excellent job with practice, a random orbital sander would do the job and in fact that’s what I use to do the finishing, and if you are either very determined or very lucky, you can use a hand plane with a rounded blade and bottom.

By lucky and determined, I mean that while those are rare its not that big a deal to make one. To make mine I used a worn out horse hoof rasp for the blade, lots of grinding required but its good steel, a block of beech for the body, an offcut of Australian Jarra for the wedge and a piece of copper rod to retain the wedge.

There is lots of information on making planes out there on the net, but most of them overcomplicate things, but if that’s the way you want to do it, you’ll find it.

So having bought my “store bought” oars,  which incidentally cost not a great deal more than enough of the more “suitable” material in plank form, I first made a couple of simple “holders” to clamp the shaft in order to work on them.

Next was to mark out the blade and the neck with a ruler and a sharpie marker,  that shape being cut out with a jigsaw and the edges planed smooth and straight.

The next step was to mark the center of the edges with the marker, and use a standard block plane to shave a bevel down the face of each side so the outer edge is at the desired thickness.

This is a guide, don’t go much past that. That’s the thickness you are after.

Next is to taper the shaft from leather to neck.  That’s a straight flat, starting very narrow at the leather and gettting wider and wider as it gets down to the neck.

You may need to remove some material at the neck to get this taper right, use a standard spokeshave here to make the hollow from the taper you are planing to the curve where the blade starts to swell out to its full width. 

Don’t round this area off yet, that comes when the blades are done.

Out comes the tool you have chosen to remove the material from the blade to make it “hollow” from the center ridge to the edge.

Work out from the marked centerline down the ridge out to the edge, I work from the tip in toward the neck as with the taper on the edge the grain is better to shave this way.

The random orbit sander can remove all the little ridges that the spokeshave or plane makes, so don’t fuss too much, just try for no lengthwise humps or hollows.

When the blade is hollowed and thinned both sides,  then fair it into the neck, remember that this is the high stress area of the oar, don’t remove too much material here,  where that central spine merges into the wide part of the neck is the critical part.  Don’t thin that down.

Round the flat that you’ve planed onto the shaft into the body of the shaft aiming for a shape at the neck which is more like an oblong with the corners well rounded than a true oval or ellipse, sand off smooth and coat with varnish or paint.

I’ll be painting the outboard end of the blades with white paint, the regular flashing of the white is visible from surprising distance. 

I’ll be fiberglassing the tips by the way,  it reduces the chances of splitting the oar when pushing the boat off rocks or such.  Just a little strip of 50mm tape folded over the tip and epoxied into place.

I’ll go into the leathering and the shaping of the handle when I get around to that stage.

In the meantime, these oars have lost about 15% of their weight, and that almost all of it from out on the blade end which makes them much easier to use.