Sweeps and Oars

[dafi]

Parallel to the 1803 ad 1910 Vics, I have been working on the boats. Or rather on the oars. The trigger was once again the "egytian paddles" that had found their way onto an otherwise great model.

 

To start with I did not yet get in contact about that topic. How long? What form? I had no idea. Hope you will be able to cofirm the ext steps.

 

Fortunately, I was given quite fast a reference to David Steel's "The art of Making Masts, Yards, Gaffs, Booms, Blocks, and Oars, as Practised in the Royal Navy, and According to the Most Approved Methods in the ... of an Improved Rule for Mast-makers", a volume I wasn´t aware of before. I just ordered my copy as I found no official legal online source. In there the relevant iformatios were given in 4 tables.

 

Oar-Making

The different parts of oars are described by the engraved figures, and their dimensions by the tables.

Ships’ sweeps and oars are made of hand-masts, or rafters, suited to the size and length, as per table. They should be chosen straight-grained, free from large knots, shakes, or rind-galls. They are first sawed, or jambed in a snatch-block, and hewed nearly to their size; then raised on horses, and completed by the drawing-knife, spoke-shave, or plane. Open handles are nailed to the sides of the loom in the direction of the flat of the blade, made of oak, about one inch and three-quarters deep, and two inches and one-quarter thick, hollowed to admit the hand easy between that and the loom: the length of the handle is one-third the length of the loom.

Barges’, lighters’ and ships’ boats’, oars are made of fir-rafters, similar to ships’, without handles to the sides of the loom.

N.B. The looms of boats’ oars are often made round.

Oars and sculls for barges, wherries, and skiffs, are made of ash (and sometimes of fir) rafters, which should be chosen tough, straight-grained, without shakes or large knots. The rough wood is taken off with an axe, and finished in a neat manner on horses by drawing-knives, spoke-shaves, and planes. A leather button is nailed on the foreside, about two inches from the loom, and that edge rounded, to work easily in the rowlock: the lower end of the blade is strapped round with tin to prevent its splitting.

Sculls for wherries, skiffs, &c. for choice and make are similar to wherries’ oars.

 

 

The sizes relevant for my Victory boats are the sweeps for the larger workboats with straight blades and the oars with curved blades for the smaller boats.

 

First the sweeps.

They have an interesting shape. The thin round handle, the square loom, the round to elliptical shank which then  transitions back into the flat of the blade.

And here is the oar.

 

 

Here the design is even more differentiated: round handle, rectangular loom, elliptical shank and the curved flat blade. Here, contemporary models are much more relaxed in the curve, which is why I have not shaped it as extremly as seen in Steel.

Also the blades have a reinforcement against splintering on the outer end, in the contemporary models usually formed as a ring and not over the edge as with Steel.

 

And, as always, the fallacy: It's programmed, so it can be printed straight away 🙂

Shull bit.

It took a lot of convincing, but in the end something useful came out.

 

Then some more color, dark brown primer and a lighter tone as brushing.

And to top it all off, a close-up 🙂

If compared to the model oars and sweeps in RGM it seems the right direction.

 

Still puzzeled about the triangular piece of leather that keeps the oar in place. How did it look and how was it fixed?

 

All the best, DAniel

 

XXXDA

 

Edited Wednesday at 10:38 AM by dafi

[Kenchington]

Fascinating! I knew of Steele's work on masting etc. but not his treatment of oars. 

 

I wonder whether anyone actually tried moving a First Rate with 52ft sweeps -- and where they might have been stowed when not in use!

 

Trevor

[dafi]

That was my first thought too. But I think that is a theoretical value. First the big ships of the line did not have sweeping ports and on top I believe towing with the small boats was much more effective. Or is there any contemporary source showing the use of sweeps on this type of ship?

 

In the meantime I got my print of that volume of Steel´s work and it has much additional information not shown in his other books. The print quality and the drawings in this hard copy are of a much better quality than another volume in paparback I got some 10 years ago. Only flaw ist that the plans and tables are spread over 2 pages, mostely even not opposite pages but on the flip page ...

 

Still puzzeling around the "A leather button is nailed on the foreside, about two inches from the loom and that edge rounded, to work easily in the rowlock" ,the small triangular

bit to be seen in the graphics. If applied correctly that means a big overlap in the middle in my examples.

 

XXXDAn

[Kenchington]

I tend to agree on the "theoretical value" explanation. I have never heard of ships-of-the-line being rowed and it is hard to see how they could have been, with the decks encumbered by their guns. Conversely, it would not be out of character for an author of a technical treatise to want to fill a table with numbers, even irrelevant numbers. 

 

Perhaps there is another explanation, however:

 

Using contemporary British terminology (and Steele was writing of British practices): When a ship was laid up In Ordinary, her guns were returned to the Ordnance Board's gunwharf. I think it was also normal to send them ashore whenever a ship was docked, so that the weight did not strain the hull, and docking was frequent in the era before coppering. I wonder whether the dockyards kept some very long sweeps on hand, to facilitate movement of ships under their care. The sweeps could have been taken out to a ship that had been stripped of her armament (perhaps with her rig stripped to a gantline too), the looms passed in through lower-deck gunports and men set to rowing. That would have given better control, when moving a bare hull to align with the entrance of a drydock, than a collection of boats filling the role later given to harbour tugs.

 

I have never heard mention of such a practice, but the technical details of dockyard work got less attention from contemporary authors than did the operations of ships in commission and hence under the command of gentlemanly officers.  

[dafi]

Please also follow the dicussion on the use of oars and sweeps here:

Enjoy, XXXDAn

Edited Wednesday at 10:39 AM by dafi

[Gregory]

Any reason to believe colonial oars would have been significantly different for this time period?