Charlie two of my oarlock risers cracked and fell apart today, only been out 4 times. What did you do to rectify the situation. Ron

   I would guess the species of wood, thickness of the wood,  and/or depth of the fasteners. 

What is that wood?  Is it oak or a mahogany?  

My 7 ft oars haven't caused any problems in the JS II. But it doesn't have that simple riser. It is mounted to the  rail with verticle screws and  with horizontal screws through the plywood to the rail. A lamination is always good.  Those areas were likely also glassed. **

Your riser is splitting grain, obiviously, where the screws are.  I'd get some dense oak or ash from my scrap bin. I'd make a little higher & wider riser that has a leg down the plywood/inside skin of the boat 2" or 3 ".. ....Then I'd fiberglass it.  Make it a fiberglass part screwed to the boat with bedding compound............Which might be over kill. 

The fiberglass likely  would have resisted the splitting in the first place if the original part was reinforced with glass and epoxy.  (Just my mind wandering around) **

I had one split on my PMD, along the grain right where one of the screws for the rowlock socket fitting passed.  Split while rowing, fairly early on.  Looking at it, I thought maybe I'd messed up and drilled the pilot holes a little too small.  Disassembled all, finished separating the riser along the break, scrubbed the mating surfaces up a bit with a bronze wire brush, glued and clamped the riser back together, screwed the rowlock back on after that cured, and it's been fine since.

.......Michael

So, my fix was to simply epoxy it all back together, then used longer screws, which go all the way through to the bottom of the wooden riser, to reattach the brass fitting. I have been out several times since and, while I still take it easy rowing, as my sailing skills improve, I use the oars less and less. Indeed, when I was a kid the thought of oars on my sabot or Lido 14' never crossed my mind. I look forward to leaving my oars at home and just kicking off from the dock and sailing to my heart's content next time. The PMDs don't need a lot of wind to move.

Here's soime video and pics of my most recent sail last Sunday when I enjoyed over 3 hours going up and down the main channel of Marina Del Rey. Added bonus to this trip: unlike nearly every other time I have taken her out: nothing broke!

https://photos.app.goo.gl/2Qyxd3sVgrEXW8J57

   Looks great Charlie

   Thank you, upspirate!

   I had a similar issue with the two risers cracking when installing the metal sockets. I guess my pilot holes were a bit too small, thankfully the whole piece didn't break off but there were checks extending the length of the risers. I ended up deepening and widening the cracks and filling them with wood flour-thickened epoxy, and overdrilling the screw holes, filling them with thickened epoxy, and reinstalling the screws with larger pilot holes. All seemed well rowing yesterday except on riser had a slight creak every few strokes, probably OK but disconcerting nonetheless. If it cracks off, I'll just epoxy the pieces together. For what it's worth, whatever wood species constitutes the risers is very soft.