Docking

[Tipster1]

I finally broke down and rented a slip nearby so I can come and go more easily. To minimize carrying stuff, I'd like to keep rudder in or on boat. Slip is in fairly shallow water and somewhat sheltered. Wind direction is variable.

2014-06-20_13-22-04_698 small.jpg (98.32 KiB) Viewed 11036 times

What is advisability of leaving rudder on or in boat?
What is suggested optimal position for CB in dock? Up or slightly down?

[GreenLake]

You certainly don't want to leave the rudder attached.

Does your cuddy have locking doors? Or even doors? If yes, then you could at least keep the tiller out the sun.

CB - I would think wants to be raised. If you leave it down, it will try to resist the rolling motion of the boat in response to every wave. As you are not on the boat, there's no benefit to you, but it will stress CB and pin. Even a little will add up, because the boat spends far less time sailing than in the slip.

My 2¢. But admittedly not based on first hand observation.

[jeadstx]

I modified my rudder head to allow the blade to raise nearly out of the water so I could keep it on while at dock without a problem.

John

[Tipster1]

Thanks for thoughts. I can't imagine how rudder would fit into cuddy, even if folded backwards, but I'll give it a try. Cuddy does lock. Rudder is sitting in cockpit right now. Eliminating wear seems like a good first principle. I'll have to watch boat's motion when weather gets going, but it's been very calm recently.

[jeadstx]

When my boat is on the trailer (which is most of the time) I keep my rudder and tiller stored in the cuddy cabin.

John

[Tipster1]

Thanks, John - I'll give it a try. I assume you have rudder in raised position and then fold tiller aft. Then whole package goes into cuddy head first. Right? Or the other way?

Mark.

[jeadstx]

I disconnect the tiller from the rudder head when I put it in the cuddy cabin. I use a wing nut on the tiller bolt to make putting it on and off easier. It should still fit in there if together, just harder to position. I put the rudder in head first, just my habit.

John

[Tipster1]

Uh, that's cheating, John! Besides, I just got finished installing rudder up-haul and down-haul lines with tension release cleat on down haul similar to Tim Webb's boat:



Tiller removal would definitely defeat the goal of jump-in-the-boat-on-a-moment's notice sailing. I guess a few snaps would work, but first I'll try the fold it backwards and put in cuddy approach.

[jeadstx]

OK Tipster1, if you think removing the tiller is cheating, how about my rudder head modification.


John

[Tipster1]

Fantastic! Actually reminds me of the rudder head on my previous boat, an AMF Sunbird. It didn't sail as well as the DS, but it had some much improved designs, which I wish I could add to the DS. Nicest was a spring loaded system that was both a rudder lift and a rudder hold down. Two pins and two springs designed to either hold rudder down or pull it up when it deflected past a certain point. Principle is eassy, but I don't feel like drilling holes all over the place to experiment.

Rudder Tiller 9.1.jpg (113.68 KiB) Viewed 10949 times

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PS How did you upload that picture? I still haven't figured out how to do that other than to upload as an attachment or add to gallery and then insert after I've mailed it to myself to reduce size.
Mark

[jeadstx]

I have the pictures on Photobucket. I attach the thumbnail to my post. I made a new rudder head to allow the blade to come up out of the water for dealing with very shallow water when beaching my boat on the Texas coast.

John

[Skippa]

On my DS II the rudder/tiller assembly fits easily in the cuddy. Starboard side, on top of two throwable boat cushions to prevent any damage to the floor or the rudder.
Tiller folds back over the top and to the rear of the tiller. 30 seconds to remove and stow, Less than a minute from cuddy to mounted on the stern.
I keep my boat on a small lake in a mooring field with about 25-30 other boats. Some are skilled sailors and some less so. I figure it is one less thing to get damaged in the event of an unplanned meeting of the neighbors while I am away,

[GreenLake]

If you remove your rudder frequently, you might pay attention to what method you use for ensuring that the pintles don't slide out of the gudgeons. Some methods are very secure, but fiddly to put in, especially on the water. I rarely have to contend with chop, so I found in my case, these two are sufficient (and can be disengaged with one hand while lifting the rudder with the other).



If you look closely you will see an L shaped little bracket that's screwed in not so tight that it can't swing down by gravity. That stops the rudder from rising. As backup, there's the bent strip of stainless that's barely visible on the left. It angles away from the rudder at 30 degrees and rests on the tip of the pintle. When raising the rudder, it would wedge itself under the gudgeon.

When installing, the L bracket is easily pushed away sideways and the strip doesn't resist going down, and best of all, unlike some other systems, you can't forget to engage them.

(That said, for longer cruises in rough conditions, a cotter pin through the tip of the pintle is most secure).

[Tipster1]

Thanks Skippa. I finally figured it out. A detachable CB DH helps a lot. Finally got sailing today. Spring away CB DH cleat worked just as hoped. No unplanned raising, but when I hit bottom, cleat popped and the CB came up, just enough. I didn't get into shallow enough water to test similar arrangement on rudder.

At least in our waters, leaving rudder on would be stressful to equipment and risky. It can get pretty nasty.

To GreenLake, I'd been wondering what that tab was for. It looked like reinforcement for tiller because mine is not turn-able. I'll give it a harder push next time. There is a nice spring clip that holds pintle onto gudgeon on my boat. (hmm - spell check doesn't know those words!)

To avoid traumatic interaction between rudder and prop, I finally gave up and I just pull the rudder if I am using motor for docking. It is going to take a while to get used to little, hand controlled OB. Port side tiller/throttle and starboard side shift. Are these things for lefties?

John, I noticed that you put OB on port side. Does that work any easier?

[GreenLake]

To GreenLake, I'd been wondering what that tab was for. It looked like reinforcement for tiller because mine is not turn-able. I'll give it a harder push next time. There is a nice spring clip that holds pintle onto gudgeon on my boat. (hmm - spell check doesn't know those words!)

Spell checkers are generally clueless about boat terms.

BTW, there's a separate bit that supports the tiller. It's screwed into the rudder head and positioned so that the lowest point the tiller can be pushed to doesn't scrape the deck or coamings. Usually that's a bit higher than where the tiller would end up if it was allowed to come to rest on the rudder head itself. When I built the replacement for my rudder, I had t reverse engineer all of these details.... (the one thing I didn't get right is that the neck on my new rudder head is too wide, so the tiller doesn't fold back all the way; but the angle is small enough to not matter in practice.)