Human-powered watercraft

Human-powered watercraft are watercraft propelled only by human power, instead of being propelled by wind power (via one or more sails) or an engine. The three main methods of exerting human power are: directly from the hands or feet, sometimes aided by swimfins; through hand-operated oars, paddles, or poles, or; through the feet with pedalss, crankset or treadle. While most human-powered watercraft use buoyancy to maintain their position relative to the surface of the water, a few, such as human-powered hydrofoils and human-powered submarines, use hydrofoils, either alone or in addition to buoyancy. Rowing Oars are held at one end, have a blade on the other end, and pivot in between in oarlocks. Oared craft include: Racing shell Using oars in pairs, with one hand on each oar, is two-oar sculling. The oars may also be called sculls. Two-oared sculled craft include: Adirondack guideboat Banks dory, Gloucester dory, and McKenzie River dory Dinghy Sampans rowed by foot in Ninh Bình Province of northern Vietnam. Scull, Single scull, Double scull, Quad scull, and Octuple scull Skiff Row boat Using oars individually, with both hands on a single oar, is sweep or sweep-oar rowing. In this case the rowers are usually paired so that there is an oar on each side of the boat. Sweep-oared craft include: Coxless pair, Coxed pair, Coxless four, Coxed four, and Eight Galley, Dromon, Trainera, and Trireme Moving a single stern-mounted oar from side to side, while changing the angle of the blade so as to generate forward thrust on both strokes, is single-oar sculling. Single-oar sculled craft include: Gondola Sampan Sandolo Paddling Paddled watercraft, or paddlecraft, uses one or more handheld paddles, each with a widened blade on one or both ends, to push water and propel the watercraft.. Commonly seen paddlecrafts include: Canoe, Outrigger canoe, Umiak, Waka, Pirogue, Shikara, Dragon boat, and Dugout Kayak, Sea kayak, Flyak, and Baidarka Coracle Paddleboard Pedals are attached to a crank and propelled in circles, or to a treadle and reciprocated, with the feet.

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Related concepts (6)

Paddle

A paddle is a handheld tool with an elongated handle and a flat, widened distal end (i.e. the blade), used as a lever to apply force onto the bladed end. It most commonly describes a completely handheld tool used to propel a human-powered watercraft by pushing water in a direction opposite to the direction of travel (i.e. paddling). It is different to an oar (which is similar in shape and performs the same function via rowing) in that the latter is attached to the watercraft via a fulcrum.

Rowing

Rowing is the act of propelling a human-powered watercraft using the sweeping motions of oars to displace water and generate reactional propulsion. Rowing is functionally similar to paddling, but rowing requires oars to be mechanically attached to the boat, and the rower drives the oar like a lever, exerting force in the same direction as the boat's travel; while paddles are completely hand-held and have no attachment to the boat, and are driven like a cantilever, exerting force opposite to the intended direction of the boat.

Oar

An oar is an implement used for water-borne propulsion. Oars have a flat blade at one end. Rowers grasp the oar at the other end. The difference between oars and paddles is that oars are used exclusively for rowing. In rowing the oar is connected to the vessel by means of a pivot point for the oar, either an oarlock, or a thole. The oar is placed in the pivot point with a short portion inside the vessel, and a much larger portion outside. The rower pulls on the short end of the oar, while the long end is in the water.