Many older oars have had hard lives. It’s not just the years, but things like rough docks, accidents, and the weather take their toll.

Following on from the paint stripping archeological dig, this set of oars all had worn and damaged end tips and one also had a significant chip off the top edge.

I’ve seen the ‘old school’ boatmen do these repairs very quickly, but here is how I’m bumbling along…

Damaged and worn down.

Old tip removed with chisel.

New tip bonded in place.

Trimmed with saw, then planed to shape.

Two replaced tips beside unrepaired oars.

Then I had to repair the damaged top edge…

With small chips it is usually easiest to do a repair with some epoxy filler, but when bigger chunks are gone you need to use pieces of timber. This is how the oars were repaired to rowable condition back in the day.

First I planed the area smooth. Then some new spruce was bonded into place. For economy a thin piece was used, but it had to be put on in two sections so that it could deal with the curve of the blade face. It does stick out a bit!

Then the rough outline for the repaired shape is pencilled on (see above) with the aid of another oar as template, and the excess material was cut off with a jig saw.

Still a bit lumpy, so a small plane was used on the convex back of the blade and a spokeshave used on the concave front of the blade.

Then a bit of coarse sanding to get the shape and edge looking good.

There is still some more work to be done with sanding and light filling, but very soon these two oars will be ready to be painted.

It’s a lot of work, but the final result is worth it.

Early last year I was asked to paint a blade to commemorate the first women’s crew to take part in the Around the Island Race. The RHKYC had just purchased its first coastal rowing boats in 2006 and there were only a handful of rowers crazy enough to think that racing 45km around Hong Kong Island would be a good way to spend your weekend.

The rower who commissioned the trophy said that she was going to present it to her crew mate. I thought that was very nice of her and proceeded to complete the oar.

When done, the customer said it was lovely and asked how the second blade was going.

Second blade? Ummm…

Somewhere along the email chain this small detail was missed or presumed. I did think she was being very generous, but she actually wanted a copy for herself too!

There was no problem with creating a second blade, but there was going to be a slight delay. I was just about to move from Hong Kong to London and all my materials were to be packed and shipped.

Six months later I had a matching copy and the customer was able to collect them.

Almost to the day, Carrie gave this gift to Sara to celebrate the 10th anniversary of this epic first row. What a wonderful way for two great friends to recall their great adventure!

 

Sara and Carrie racing past a Star Ferry in Victoria Harbour. Sara with her gift.

 

As a small update to my previous comments about paint stripping, here are some photos to illustrate.

This set of oars has certainly had a few lives. As best as I can see, they have had at least three different paint jobs.

• White with a blue band (white undercoat)
• Yellow (white undercoat)
• Yellow front with black back (grey undercoat), and
• a second coat of the same with slightly different paint