I have a pair of Sawyer counterbalanced hybrid oars. The handles are 1 3/4" fiberglass shafts and the blades are 36" long Ash. Unfortunately cancer has invaded the blades, aka; dry rot. Sawyer makes replacement blades for them at $160 a pair, which I think is kinda steep but they would be like new if they were replaced. Anybody have any experience with replacing oar blades or alternative solutions; i.e. different Mfg???

Try this. Get some of the viscous epoxy penetrating liquid from Rotdoctor.com. $30. It will soak into the wood, nullifying the rot. Rebuild the balance of the rotted oar material with epoxy/microspheres putty mixture, then reshape. Finally, coat the blades with some fiberglass and wet it out. It may not look pretty, but it should hold together. Might cost you about $60. I may have some spare fiberglass cloth if you need enough to do two oars.

Not sure exactly the model of the sawyer oars you have. Check into some of the other manufacturers blades (carlisle and cataract), many are interchangable. Definately worth looking into.

Here's a site to you may want to check out, they carry the solid ash oar blades for

$24 ea

I don't know as much about repair as Dogfish so his fix may be just fine. However oars are something I would want in premo shape. An oar is the last thing I want to go wrong when setting up in a slot or going down a some heavy water. Just my .02

The acceptable amount of dry rot in a wood wing spar is NONE.

I'd hold my oar blades to the same citeria.

JMHO

what dan says, u have too much riding on the oars to even think of maybe getting the fix/repair strong enough.

I have two sets of those exact oars. A buddy started a whitewater rafting company several years ago and bought 20 pairs. Turns out, they were heavy and not real good for white water rafting, but nice for backtrolling in a drift boat. To make a long story short, he gave them away to a lot of people. The guys who left them in the boat outside not covered found that they de-laminated real fast. If you keep them in the garage or something, they last a long time. I like them, most people think they suck because they are so heavy. Rather than re-build or repair them, I would just get some different ones, or if you really want those, I know where you could get a new set for pretty cheap. They don't make them anymore I don't think. He has some in a storage shed, both 9 and 10 ft lengths.

I'm kind of with you guys on the repair aspect of this. It's so far gone that I'd have to remove sections of the oar with a router and introduce new wood in kind of matching spline fashion. Way too much work in my opinion for what I'd end up with in the long run. My skills at repairing stuff are pretty extreme and I have the tools but I don't figure the time vs. end result are worthwhile but thanks for the replies in that regard just the same.

B-Run I'm with your bud on the wieght of these oars. It's exactly why they work so well on my sled. They're very easy to move around on my application but light weight oars are a pain in the arse. My oars are 11' long but I may be interested if they're cheap enough just to pull the blades. Pipers $50 solution would work but I'd loose 6" off the tip of the blade and that would be a noticable 6". I'm all ears!!!

TTT

Hey B-Run please see previous post.

Thanks guys!

T.C - I will ask him as soon as he gets off the Owyhee river in S.E Oregon. Its running pretty good right now and they went last friday. The way I understand it they had so much fun they went back and are doing it again... they will run out of beer and have to come home sometime I'll let you kinow later this week