[Doug Odgers]

At last  A90  ‘Jenaka’  afloat after at least 4 years.

However,  every advance brings a new challenge.  There are two mooring lines coming off the stern buoy and despite keeping them relatively taught,  to reduce swing, I can see that one or the other scrapes the uphaul wire.

Perhaps in the winter I’ll  convert to a vertical sliding blade as outlined on the AOA website. BUT  i.n the meantime, what do I do ?

Perhaps a piece of stiff hose temporarily fixed to top of rudder ?

Potential drying means rudder has to be up.

All contributions gratefully received.

 

 

 

Topic

[Mike Dixon]

She’s looking good Doug!

Without looking at the ‘problem’, can’t be specific.  Only advice I would suggest is that you protect ALL culprits to eliminate or reduce chafe.  This would include the top edge of the raised rudder, the rudder uphaul wire and the two mooring ropes.  And keep a careful eye on the set up. I’m assuming that the mooring lines can’t get underneath the rudder blade – another potential problem.

Vertical lifting rudder is a potential solution, but not to be undertaken lightly – lots of modification work to be carried out.

One other though just occured – have you an additional temporary line to hold the rudder up whilst the boat is on the mooring?  If you rely on the rudder uphaul wire alone, and then it gives way, the rudder will drop and at the next low water  – at best – risk the blade being  bent, or – at worst – risk severely damaging the rudder and stock.  At least one boat has had the rudder and stock ripped from the transom and the boat holed and sunk as a result.  Maybe a bit of a faff rigging an additional temporary line, but………………

Cheers

Mike

[AOA]

Hi Doug

Great news – great sailing to come!

Before commenting on your original query I will strongly second Mike’s suggestion to add secondary means of holding the rudder up. Ideally two lines, one to each quarter, which helps hold the rudder amidships. See photo of Helene’s arrangement when I had her:

Rudder safety line to keep it in the raised position

On your first point, definitely protect the mooring lines, rudder and rudder lines from chafing each other.
One thought to keep the rudder away from the mooring lines is not to raise it completely – leave it just submerged so that it does to foul the moring lines. The issue then changes to how to prevent damage when taking the ground.
Leaving the downhaul slack would allow the rudder to rise on grounding and drop on floating. However slack uphaul / downhaul lines can lead to them slipping off the blocks through the transom or in the rudder and jamming.

You could rig shockcord to keep the uphaul / downhaul tensioned at all times. Lengths of shockcord passed vertically over the horizontal uphaul/downhaul lines in the aft cabin pulling towards the cabin floor would keep them tensioned? (Helene had more complex shockcord arrangements to keep the lines tensioned).

An interesting challenge! Let us know how you get on.

Nick

[Doug Odgers]

Mike & Nick,

Many thanks for your suggestions.

Looks as if the solution is far less complicated than I anticipated.

Doug

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