Good set of oars

" At sea, I learned how little a person needs, not how much. "  

Robin Lee Graham

I decided early on that for my boat I wanted to build my oars.  The book I am using to build the boat, "Heidi- a 12' skiff for Sail and Oar" by Rich Kolin, has a great chapter on building them so I had at it.
Above you can see the octagon layed out to form what will eventually be a round, 8, 16, 32 and then round,  just like the spindles on my chairs.

Above you can see the neat little gauge, a spar gauge, used to lay out the lines.  It traces two lines regardless if the pieces taper or not.

Not sure if you can see it but this piece of spruce had some birds-eye in it.

Octagon layed out and planed.  I had planned to use a draw knife more but the grain was funky so I used a spokeshave instead.  Change of tact, you might say.

Rounded off with a spokeshave followed by paper.

I recently made a new shave horse (next post) so students wouldn't have to share.  I also made it a different style so they could try both to give them a better idea of the styles.  This style does much better at holding long pieces, like oars or the back of a settee I'm building for a client.

Here are all the tool used for the oars, save the bandsaw and paper.

I really like this Stanley block plane.  The mouth really opens up and it has a Hock blade, the best blades on the market in my opinion.

Here is the blade and tip.  I am really looking forward to using them soon.  All that's left on the boat is the outside paint.  But I have been really busy with chairs and classes and life, but in the water by the 4th..."second star to the left and straight on 'til dawn"