Looking for oars advice and where to buy oars longer than 8ft?

[sailor]

As a person who on same trip lost rudder, plugged outboard water cooling and lost a seal an a trolling motor, needing to paddle my boat for a while (with grandma and 3 young kids onboard to boot :) ) I decided it's time to look for oars.
Unfortunately I was able to find reasonable priced oars only up to 8ft long.
My boat is same as Smollett's "Wave Function", 17ft long, 7.5ft beam,  about 2000lbs.
The distance between oarlocks would be about 7ft - I think that would mean at least 10ft oars, especially that gunwales are higher here than on a regular rowing boat.
I'm envisioning a removable rowing bench wedged in the cockpit.
If I can't find cheap oars long enough, I was considering buying shorter ones and replacing the shafts, but that's still expensive.
I was also considering a yuloh, but I like set of sweeps better (and my 8 years old and DW can row too in a pinch).

Any ideas?
Thanks!

[CharlieJ]

Longer would be better, but think about rowing standing up, facing forward, tiller between your legs.

Just an option to consider.

You might also consider building your own oars- there are many sites around with designs- just google "building oars". That gave me a million hits :D

[Porter Wayfare]

NRS (I think that stands for Northern River Sports, but I'm not sure.  Anyway, www.nrsweb.com/  ) has aluminum and and/or fiberglass or carbon fiber shafts with removable blades from a couple of hundred dollars to close to $800 with oarlocks.  They're great for stowing. 

[Tim]

From their site;

The initials ?NRS? stand for Northwest River Supplies. When Bill Parks started the company in Eugene, Oregon in 1972, his primary customers were from around the Pacific North West, and they were mostly fellow river enthusiasts. At the time, the name explained perfectly what our company was about. Over the years, as our employees and customers started branching out into other areas of paddlesports, our company did too. These days, ?Northwest River Supplies? doesn?t tell the full story of who we are. Our enthusiasm for paddlesports has grown to include lakes and oceans, and our products are used by paddlers in every part of the world. We shortened our name simply to NRS, to show that we focus on more than just river supplies, and more than just this corner of the world.

I have purchased a lot of equipment from them over the years, going all the way back to the 70's. I just recently bought a new PFD from them with pockets for important gear.

[Leroy - Gulf 29]

FWIW... Did you consider sculling?  Easier than carrying 2 10' sticks aboard a 17' boat for emergency use.

[marujo_sortudo]

Well according to the Shaw & Tenney formula, you'd want 12 to 13' oars which would be plenty expensive and hard to stow.  A sculling oar would be sized based on your freeboard at the transom and might actually be smaller (IIRC, roughly 3' per foot of freeboard.)  Plus you could use it to row on one side when not sculling while using the tiller to compensate, Pardey-style.  A yuloh would be good option, too.

[rorik]

I used to scull my `Frisco Flyer. I had a 12' ash oar from a life boat. Worked great. A yuloh might have been better. Try here:

http://www.duckworksmagazine.com/11/howto/yuloh/index2.htm

[w00dy]

I'm planning on making a solid greenland style paddle for my kayak. I bought a nice clear piece of 2x6 cedar for $20 yesterday. Why not go the the local lumberyard and look around for the nicest 12' pieces of framing lumber you can buy and make your own. No need to make them fancy. These will be your oars, so make them to fit your purpose and budget. You have total control

http://www.instructables.com/id/twobyfoars/
http://www.instantboats.com/oarmaking.htm
http://www.boatbuildercentral.com/howto/oars.php
http://www.diybob.com/oars.htm (Quick and dirty! Just the way I like it ;D)

[s/v Faith]

There was a guy on the pearsonariel.org site a few years ago who used to row his Ariel.  He sat on the bridge deck facing aft and had a way to attach the oars to his winches.

He was very happy with the set up.  Never tried it, but always intended to.

[Oldrig]

There was a guy on the pearsonariel.org site a few years ago who used to row his Ariel.  He sat on the bridge deck facing aft and had a way to attach the oars to his winches.

He was very happy with the set up.  Never tried it, but always intended to.

Somewhat OT, but:

Wish I could remember his name. He also posted extensively on sheet-to-tiller steering. I emailed him once about that and he said his son-in-law had given him an ST2000 tiller pilot, so he stopped using the sheet-to-tiller setup.

--Joe

[Captain Smollett]

There was a guy on the pearsonariel.org site a few years ago who used to row his Ariel.  He sat on the bridge deck facing aft and had a way to attach the oars to his winches.

He was very happy with the set up.  Never tried it, but always intended to.

Somewhat OT, but:

Wish I could remember his name. He also posted extensively on sheet-to-tiller steering. I emailed him once about that and he said his son-in-law had given him an ST2000 tiller pilot, so he stopped using the sheet-to-tiller setup.

This it?

http://www.solopublications.com/sailariq.htm

[Oldrig]

You've got it, John.  ;D