Dear All,
The temperature is rising so I started to prepare my boat for the season. During cleaning I noticed a splitting of the rudder. It seems like the paint is cracking over the middle downwards. At the bottom on the back there's also a crack. Does anybody know how the rudder is made? Is there a wood core? Or is it polyester glued together?
I'm thinking of opening up the crack and then try filling it with epoxy. Any other thought would be appriciated!
Afterwards a bit of paint, does someone know the RAL colorscheme of hull and deck?
Today i removed the rudder to take to a grp specialist. I've contacted honnor marine and that was their advice. It looks like no wood is used in the rudder. I hope so, when moving the rudder i could hear water inside.when turning upside down it came out.
I think the reason of the tear could be because the helm is only fixed with one bolt. When steering forces on this bolrt may be responsible for torsion.
I thought i saw a rudder on the forum with a large plate on both sides to dispers forces.
I going to look into that.
The rudder is constructed in two halves and several owners have reported cracks appearing between the two. Mine showed a crack on the trailing edge at about waterline level, so I cut into the crack with a dremel and filled it with epoxy to seal. There was no water evident. Chris Wicks had more serious problems and a lot of water within. In the worst case a new one could be constructed either out of GRP or perhaps wood.
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Charles Erb
CC86 Aurora
travellingaurora.wordpress.com
There is a whole thread named Rudder Problems covering these issues. Kaliope has always had some rudder problems with various repairs over the years.
I copied the plans of Ian (a previous owner of Ladybird) and successfully fitted stainless steel reinforcement plates. The water still manages to get in the rudder somehow during a summer afloat, but the reinforcement plates are very good. I have added a link to the album above.
Henk who has Dipper also had a similar problem with his rudder and is currently having the same reinforcement applied to his boat.
