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Barrie Robinson the inventor of the OarRATER rating watch has got a nice review in NZ Rowing Magazine .

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Rowperfect customer Gareth Duffill was desperate to get hold of his new sculler's rear view mirror before a race at the weekend.

We succeeded in hand-delivering the parcel to him near his work and he sent us a delighted SMS this morning.

Hi Rebecca, thanks for bringing the mirrors to Twickenham.  We won our Vet Novice Class at the Webridge Silver Sculls!  Best regards, Gareth.

When we can make it work out for our customers, we do try to overcome adversity.

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Image via Wikipedia

Ian South, longtime Kingston Rowing Club coach and former coach to  internationals Rebecca Romero, Sarah Birch and Jen Goldsack has been testing and reviewing sculls for an article in the UK Rowing and Regatta magazine.

We sent him a pair of Dreher carbon adjustable Apex (£399), Dreher Club Big Blades (£350) and Dreher Aeros (£499) to add to the large pile of competing brands.

I won't spoil the output of the article but he did give us some feedback:

An athlete using any of the Dreher sculls can immediately tell that they feel different.  Event the least competent sculler I gave them to could determine the difference between Drehers and the other brands.  The grip in the water is noticable.

The Drehers came up favourably compared to the others.  

I was particularly impressed with the Club sculls - these should be selling well in the clubs - they are well designed and the price is extremely favourable.

I tested the stiffness using a deflection test for all the sculls using a laser level and a 10kg weight and the Drehers were stiff and consistent. 

This is a good blade.  It is the only one in the marketplace that is robust and is manufactured consistently the same.

If you are a club, why spend an extra £50 [on a different brand] you won't get anything more for it.

You'll have to wait for the whole article to come out to get the rest of his comparison to other designs.

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We got an enquiry from Seema Khehar of Putney Town Rowing Club

Hi Rebecca,

Quick query for you - I (and a couple of others from PTRC) bought our
Dreher Sculls from you. Is there any maintainence I can do on the
sculls - the shaft and spoons are getting pretty battered. We were not
sure if there was a product we can use to spruce up again…

Kind Regards

Seema

Here is our reply:

Suggested Maintenance

1. To clean the sculls, use white spirit twice a year – this removes all grease and watermarks.
2. Wash the handles using detergent and a sponge to keep grips grease-free every week.
3. When you come in to land turn the spoons so the tips are down to the ground and don’t allow them to scrape along the ground as this wears out the back of the spoon.  The back of the spoon is important for hydrodynamic lift http://www.rowperfect.co.uk/news/hydrodynamic-lift-why-its-important-in-oar-and-scull-design/
4. Pushing off from the bank, square the blade so it pushes equally off the length of the spoon tip so one part doesn’t wear more than others

Replacing scull parts

Ultimately, the sculls will wear out.  But the Dreher design is modular.  It is comprised three parts – handle, shaft and spoon.  If you want to replace one part we can do this for you.  For example, if the corners of your spoons are worn we can replace just the spoons and you an re-use the shafts and handles and get a refurbished set of sculls for a good price.

Each scull blade £66.55
Each scull shaft with button and sleeve £83.19
Each scull handle £45.00

Labour £25 per hour.  It’ll take one hour to change the spoon or shaft.  You can replace the handles yourself with an 8mm spanner.

We consider it important for clubs and individuals who own Drehers that if you have a breakage or your sculls wear out, you can get them refurbished without having to go to the expense of buying a whole new set.

Tideway Scullers School had a quad set of Big Blade Dreher Sculls- they chose to replace the spoons on these and then to re-use the old, more worn spoons with new Club scull design shafts and handles (Club sculls are cheaper) thus making up two quad sets for less than the price of a new set.

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Thanks to Gill Shaw for her advice on how to measure up a boat for a boat bag.

We thought we'd share it online for anyone else needing to know!

As an idea, you may want to give people some tips on how to measure their boat.  We found the easiest way was to take (masking tape) a tape measure to the boat and then calculate and note the 16" intervals to take the circumferences with a dressmaking measure.  And for the other measurements we put masking tape across the boat with a mark in pencil for the point we used to measure the cockpit.  
 

Here are the measuring charts you will need to complete if we don't have your boat 'pattern' on file (note inches not centimeters) with the measurements for a conventinal rigger 1x boat  or for a wing rigger 1x boat (the chart is different for measuring).   For doubles and pair measurement charts go to the boat bags page

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We have introduced a new section in the shop "Specials" where we list special offers and end of season discounts.

These are new products.

Our ex-demonstation products are sold in a separate category "Ex Demonstration Stock". These have been used by clubs and individuals to trial the product.

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Recently following a thread on RSR I did some research into the three major oar manufacturers and what they say about how their oars and sculls perform in a deflection test.  when a 10kg weight is hung from the neck of the blade.  This gives a comparison of the relative stiffness of each design.

 
Image from C2

Sources: Concept 2 and Dreher. Croker came from their NZ distributer.  I couldn't find deflection data anywhere else.

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Rowperfect has long tried to deliver three things to its customers:

• High quality products
• Value for money
• Excellent customer service

Like many firms the slowdown in the economy is expected to affect our business.  In addition, we buy some of our products from Australia and America and so there are changes in the currency exchange rates to consider as well.

The Economist magazine says

The downturn will accelerate the use of social media, such as blogs and social networking sites, by consumers looking for intelligence on firms and their products.  As trust in brands is eroded, people will place more value on recommendations from friends.  Social media make it harder for brands to pull the wool over consumers' eyes, but they also offer canny companies a powerful new channel through which to promote their wares and test new products and pricing strategies.

Marketers ignore the messages that emanate from these groups at their peril.  For one thing is clear: this recession has triggered a wholesale reapppraisal by shoppers of the value that their habitual brands deliver.  The winners will be those that adapt intellligently to the new reality.  The losers will be those who think they can win simply by telling consumers to "Want it!"

We are trying to offer you products across the range of athlete and coach needs from beginners to Olympians and so we want to tell you a bit about how we've adjusted our prices and our products to try and enable you, our customers, to get good quality rowing and sculling equipment at a fair price that will suit your needs.

Dreher

We have worked with Dreher to build a new type of sculling oar that fits between the fixed length scull (£270) and the carbon adjustable (£399).  This is called the "Club Scull" (£350) and is both adjustable and will suit most athletes after they have learnt to scull and are training in club crew boats. The range of spoon / handle options is limited. The blade design is the same as the carbon adjustables.  The club sculls are made in 100% carbon with no fibreglass.  The price is also very competitive at £349.  And at the top of the range the Aero scull is a new aerofoil shaft design for elite and veteran athletes seeking incremental boat speed from an aerodynamic design.

Coxmate

Taking advantage of the Australian dollar exchange rate not having changed much against the Pound, we are trying to keep the price of all Coxmates unchanged.  The range now includes coxless boat speed / rate / time measurement with Coxmate HC (£167) as well as the coxed boat range of AA (voice) £196, SRT (time / rate) £270 and SCT (speed ) £588.  We are shortly going to reveal an improved SRT with a larger display screen - at the same price as the old model.

Additionally we've added the rate-only Cadence watch (£59.99) which is a lower price product for rowers and scullers who want to know ratings in an easy-to-use model that isn't tied to use in a boat with wires.

Please take time to read the customer reviews that are on our shop.  Each product has at the bottom of the page a button "Write Review" and if you want to add your views to the ones already there, please do.  

We are already getting increased enquiries from clubs who've never bought our products before.  They have used internet search to research prices for rowing and sculling equipment.  We offer a demonstration trial to those who want to check how these brands work in practice and we find that around 90% of people who try Dreher and Coxmate buy the trial unit.

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Rowperfect UK has been appointed agent for Burnham Boat who make fabulous padded bags for storing your rowing equipment.  Many of you will have seen their single scull boat bags which have a red flag integrated into the stern and are made of fabric called "Sunbrella" which resists the deteriorating effect of the sun's ultraviolet radiation on the hull of your boat.  

Each cover is made to closely fit your boat and can be used while the boat is rigged - perfect if you store yours outside.  More detail is on this page or in the shop Accessories section for pricing.

Additionally we are stocking their rigger and oar bags.

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The USA Rowing News magazine published an article written by coach Topher Bordeau as a review of the Dreher Aero sculls in the December issue 2008.

Two things affect the speed of rowers and their equipment: propulsion and drag.and while there's only one source of propulsion, drag comes from two places: the water through which you propel your shell, and the air moved by you and everything not in the water.  The faster you go the greater the drag.And whil shells have always been designed to reduce the drag of water on the hull, few products have sought to increase aerodynamic efficiency.  

Dreher's new Aero sculls utilize the same design trick to get more aerodynamically friendly and increaase propulsive force…

Dreher Aero sculls review article

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