Oars and Rot

The oars are coming along. I Need to do some sanding on the handles but otherwise they are about ready for painting.

I used a couple of chisels on the rot in the stern stem. The good news is that the stem is made from two pieces glued together and the rot was limited to only one piece. The bad news is that there was a lot more rot than I was hoping. At one point the wood I was scooping out was the texture of wood putty. I ended up taking around six or seven inches off the end of the stem.

I'm going to let the wood dry then apply some wood hardener in case I missed any rot then fill in with putty and wood.

Here's a picture showing the rot.