EZ Row on Annapolis Wherry?

Builder's Forum
1

 After a long absence from building boats I am considering building an Annapolis Wherry tandem. I rowed quite a bit years ago and enjoyed it but it's been a long time. I have built a Chesapeake 17 and a Sport Tandem and use the Chesapeake fairly often. The Sport tandem not so often - it's fast but not very comfy so we usually paddle it for no more than 30 minutes at a time.

My GF and I went to Newport Beach last month for CLC's demo day and I rowed the Annapolis Wherry that was there. At my size - about 6'4" and 235 pounds it seems the tandem would be more suitable, especially if I take a passenger.

At age 70 my neck no longer swivels as easily as it once did so I've been looking at forward facing rowing setups. The one I am leaning toward is the "EZ Row", which is a drop in unit intended mainly for canoes. It looks like it will fit the Wherry Tandem but it depends on the gunwales for support of the rower's weight plus the weight of the unit - about 40 pounds - for a total of about 275 pounds.

Anyone have any experience with the EZ Row? Any guesstimate about the gunwales' ability to support it?

thanks,

John in (sometimes) sunny San Diego

2

The tandem wherry seems to be one of the very few CLC designs that  can accomodate forward rowing without some customization. This is because when you reverse direction you need to shift the rower forward to keep the center of gravity in the middle of the boat, and because there needs to be some place to put your feet. The spacings of the frames in the tandem are just right to fit a forward rower.

I built a tandem wherry and I row it forwards using my brother's proprietary Gryffyn Rower.The Gryffyn is a highly engineered gearbox that replicates conventional rowing motion (including feathering). I like it, but then I'm biased.  I haven't seen the EZ-row so I can't speak to that system.  With the Gryffyn I cruise at a little over 4 mph (over a 1-hour row) and max out at about 5.2 mph.

I built the wherry so that I could spin the RowWIng around and row either forwards or backwards. This works, but I don't row backwards much anymore. The safety, comfort, and view with forward rowing are just so much better.

Good luck with your project!