How would you like to move your cruising boat completely by yourself when there’s no wind? Consider the old standby, an oar. If can work you into a harbor in a calm or form one anchorage area to another, scull you out of a channel that’s too narrow for tacking, help you overcome a modest current if you don’t quite catch the tide, work you out of the lee of the land into that nearby breeze, or move you clear of a danger that is uncomfortably close.
Your self-made oar can do all of these things without causing noise to disturb your cruising neighbors. In calm weather any easily driven sailboat under 30 feet can be sculled or rowed at 1½ to 2 knots by a fourteen-year-old.
When we first took on Seraffyn, we had a second hand 14-foot
lifeboat oar with two separate oarlock positions, one on the portside
of the cockpit for singe oar rowing and one on the port side 
of
the taffrail for sculling. For several years I rowed the boat whenever
necessary, only sculling when we were in tight quarters. I row fisherman-style,
standing in the cockpit with the tiller between my legs.
When you row with only one oar, you need quite a bit of searoom. As you start to row your boat, it tends to sheer away from the thrust of the oar until you get some speed through the water. Rowing with one oar does give you a bit more torque or power than sculling, but rowing long distances is hard and tiring since you are moving the heavy oar on the powerless back-stroke.
Two years ago in British Columbia’s Gulf Islands we met Ron Wall, who lives and cruises on his engineless 26-foot San Pierre dory. He showed us the secret of the Oriental lanyard system for sculling. Before this Lin, at four feet10 inches and 100 pounds, hadn’t had the strength to row or scull Seraffyn. When I rigged Ron’s lanyard connection, she immediately took over and powered our 5 ½ -ton cutter like a veteran sampan lady.
Once you learn to keep this line tight at all times, the lanyard will take the upward load or thrust as you scull back and forth with the oar blade at about 35 degrees to the surface. The lanyard also helps twist or feather the oar in the correction direction at the end of each stroke to minimize the necessary wrist-twisting effort. You will be able to take a completely novice boatperson, scull with them for a minute; then, watch as they carry on alone and move the boat at about 70 percent efficiency. Practice for a bit tied to your mooring or when you are in open water. It is dead simple with the lanyard.
The classic standing position is most comfortable for long-term sculling as it allows you to pendulum your upper body. This body swinging motion is easier and less tiring than using just your arms.
Even if you have an auxiliary motor, an oar is a good cheap backup and will always work. It could also serve as a temporary rudder if your main rudder should fail.
An afterword on this is that for Taliesin, at 29 feet, 6 inches length on deck and a cruising displacement of 17,900 pounds, our 15-foot, 9-inch oar works well. Lin can propel us at approximately 1½ knots in calm conditions.
This article, of course, was excerpted from Self Sufficient Sailor
and is used by the kind permission of Lin and Larry Pardey. Indeed, you
may want to take a look at their webpage. There you will find a number
of helpful books and even videos, all of interest to those who hear the
siren call of open waters and crashing wave.
http://landlpardey.com/
Back Yard Yacht Builders
A non-commercial association of amateur boat-builder enthusiasts.
All our wooden boats are Stevenson designs.