Remote controls for outboard: fail

[dbybe]

In another topic I mentioned that I was trying to plan remote controls for my outboard. I pictured how I would deal with each element. A push pull cable from a quick release ball joint at my shift lever to a lever on the tiller; A pull only bicycle shift cable from the carb linkage to a lever at the tiller (carb linkage has a spring return); and a rigid link, with quick release ball joints, from the side of the motor to side of the rudder head. I decided to start first with the motor to tiller link. I drilled holes in the motor housing and taped holes in the side of the rudder head. I measured carefully to make sure the ball joints were at the same distance from the pivots of the rudder and motor.  I had it all hooked up and went to test it. Motor started to follow the rudder a little but then turned the opposite direction. The rod angle between the motor and rudder is too steep. It seems obvious now that it is in place. I am too embarrassed to even take a picture of it. I think I will put this whole project on hold and get the boat back in the slip.

[bruce]

Sorry the first pass had issues. New designs are fun to work out, especially if they at least try to cooperate!

One thought, does your motor clear the water without tilting when sailing? Even with my adjustable mount in the full up position, the motor still drags on a starboard tack, and I need to tilt the motor. The extra connections could be a pain, even with quick releases in place.

[Dave-in-RI]

Pictures! Pictures! Pictures!

We might be able to help remotely tinker your remote stinker— especially those of us with boats put away for the winter who live far from California.

Don't feel bad: "True pioneers are the ones face down in the mud with arrows in their back."

[dbybe]

Sorry the first pass had issues. New designs are fun to work out, especially if they at least try to cooperate!

One thought, does your motor clear the water without tilting when sailing? Even with my adjustable mount in the full up position, the motor still drags on a starboard tack, and I need to tilt the motor. The extra connections could be a pain, even with quick releases in place.

Powertiller makes a kit with remote steering and throttle/shift control. Their throttle and shift only work on motors that are designed to have these remote. Not my 6hp Yamaha but available for the 8hp. (Way too big for a Sun Cat). Their remote steering looks like a looped line. (Hard to see in their low res video). It would have to come from the back of the motor and somehow loop around either side and connect to the tiller from port and starboard. Sounds kind of messy but I may experiment a little and see if this might work, without drilling holes for now.   I re-looked at the video and it appears when you lift the motor it would just create slack in the steering control lines.

https://www.seabirdsystems.com/

[dbybe]

I did a quick mock up of a link between motor steering and tiller.  A line from the tiller through corner cleat, to back of motor, to opposite corner cleat, back to tiller.  Probably hard to see from the photos but what a mess of lines at the transom.  Also, not too elegant.  Another issue is that the motor rotates quicker than the rudder.  I think the point of connection to the motor and to the tiller need to be the same distance from the center of rotation of the motor and rudder.  This is hard to do with the tiller passing through the opening in the transom.  As a quick first pass it works better than the rigid connection I had tried.

[dbybe]

RE:  Shift and throttle linkage.

I hope this is clear. My initial thinking.

Throttle:  Disconnect rod to bronze fitting at carb.  Attach raw end of bicycle shift cable this fitting.  (adjustable arm at carb has spring return)  Route to the tiller and operate with a friction bicycle shift lever.
Shift:  Attach a quick release ball end at the shift lever, connected to a push/pull shift cable with threaded ends.  Route to a lever such as this, (https://wesconcontrols.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Push-Pull-Control-Systems.pdf)  with a clevis end.  Would probably need to disconnect at motor end to raise and tilt motor.

[bruce]

Lots to work out here. Doable, if it's worth it to you.

The uneven rate of turning of the rudder and motor could potentially be mitigated with blocks with sheaves sized appropriately. Running the lines out to the corners does optimize leverage on the motor, probably necessary. Hard to be unintrusive here. You might be able to get the lines to stay adequately tensioned over the vertical range of the motor mount, or just set it for the height you normally use and reset the tension as necessary at other heights. Tilting looks like it will just add slack to the lines, so may be OK. Does the motor being off center come into play?

The throttle and shift connections look feasible, the cables will probably handle the vertical travel at the motor mount. Tilting could be another matter, as you say.

My ePropulsion Spirit 1.0 electric outboard has a remote throttle. Bluetooth or hard wired, but electronic. That does away with the oversized tiller that electric motors typically come with, a requirement for me. I mention this only because they provided hardware for standard remote cable steering in lieu of the tiller. I had no interest in this so I removed the hardware, but the instructions did say that to tilt the motor you had to disconnect the link arm. Height on the motor mount wasn't limited. A cable steering system might work for you, still pretty clunky.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LoqsBa3gvs

I steer with the motor at times around the dock when there isn't enough flow over the rudder for it to be effective. Backing out into the fairway especially I'm facing aft and steering with both the rudder and motor, one hand on each. Nothing elegant about it, but it gets the job done. The rest of the time the motor is centerlined and I'm steering by the rudder. I'm sure you've done the same.

I hope you can work out a system that fits your needs! You seem comfortable with mechanical connections but I'll throw in a plug for McMaster Carr here. Great source for all sorts of fittings and hardware.
https://www.mcmaster.com

[bruce]

Yeah, sheathed cable steering works OK for wheel steering, but not so much with a tiller.

Using the ePropulsion set up as an example, with the sheath fixed somewhere to starboard, and the cable run out to the tiller, pushing the tiller to starboard extends the cable at the motor. Connected to the link arm, the motor is turned to port and drives the boat to starboard. Meanwhile, the rudder is turning the boat to port.

I can envision a lever that would reverse the direction of the cable travel. The cable made up to the forward end, a pivot somewhere in the middle, and the aft end made up to the link arm. The pivot could be positioned to make up for the turning differential of the motor and rudder, but the whole thing is way too complicated.

I'd go back to your port and starboard lines approach. If you attached the lines well back on the tiller so that the travel at the attachment as the tiller is swung closely matches what you want on the motor, 4-6" of travel over a 45º arc for example, you might be able get it close to 1:1. Dyneema with high strength, low stretch, good chafe resistance, and ease of splicing could do well here. With the lines fixed well aft on the tiller they'd be less intrusive in the cockpit.

[Dave-in-RI]

Often we get stuck focusing on solving a problem, when what we should be asking ourselves is what is my desired future state / outcome? So don't think "I can't reach the tiller" etc., instead think something like "I want to steer in close quarters without reaching" etc.. Maybe the answer that way is a trolling motor side mounted as bow thruster etc (not that, but the ideas might flow better if you focus more on what you want rather than what you believe is making you not able to do that thing— now you have a goal and can list ways to achieve that goal). This comes from consulting world— give it a shot! (and yes, I know it sounds silly and doesn't always have applicability, but it's a really good exercise IMO)

[Dave-in-RI]

I just watched the Powertiller videos and have a new appreciation for the concept, at least in theory (in aesthetics, I'm not a fan). As a nod to my reframing / visioning question above, have you instead considered an extension handle for the outboard handle? There's one either on this site or the FB Compac group who took a notched piece of PVC in such a way that let him slide the gear selector from his seat, plus steer and shift for more power. In this case, his problem-to-possibilities reframe was "I wish I could use the motor from the cockpit without leaning back", rather than "I wish my motor had factory style remote controls", allowing him to think of an extension without any new possible failure points. With my own Sun Cat, which I've only used a few times so far, I did an 8 mile r/t motor voyage up the Taunton River in MA with a few people aboard. This let me steer with the wooden boat tiller, but I wished I had throttle controls and will be looking for a similar tiller extension for my Honda 5hp (they might even exist as aftermarket parts, no pvc involved). When docking in the current, the motor was quite useful, and I was annoyed leaning over the back (with a foam life jacket on- modeling good behavior for the young niece & nephew aboard), wishing for reachable gear select and perhaps a z-bend style tiller extension to allow wider arc steering over the transom and around the boom end / double end mainsheet birds nest of lines. I asked why, and decided that next time I'll try a wooden paddle— cheaper, nothing to break, "slow is pro", it's a built in "push away stick", and there's a lot less anxiety (maybe not the right word- stress?) trying to do it all with motor in close quarters which even on minimum throttle in gear goes faster than I sometimes want. Only half joking, but perhaps there's a steering "thruster" option you could make with a battery drill and a long "stir paint bucket" blade and propeller. Use the wood tiller for steering but add a go-go-gadget sometimes needed stern thruster. Or a lee board / air brake / flaps by dropping something in the water like holding a canoe paddle into the water to rotate. I heard an Elon musk quote about making stuff  - "the best part is no part". Not being a nay sayer, just too much coffee!

[Dave-in-RI]

Here are some pics from a recent FB group (Compac Cat Boats) post, as food for thought:

Post:
"A couple of months ago I posted how this old guy (81) found it was difficult to reach over the stern for the shifter, start button and electric tilt of my Horizon Day Cat.
 I posted pictures of  prototype of my tiller extension and shifter and mentioned I was going to add a remote start and tilt and refine the installation after coming off the mooring.  Here is the final product.  I now have the tilt switch at end of the tiller, the start toggle switch with a trigger guard about 7 inches from that and a stainless hinge on the shifter.  All original items have been kept intact so I have redundant controls."

Pics:

[dbybe]

Often we get stuck focusing on solving a problem, when what we should be asking ourselves is what is my desired future state / outcome? So don't think "I can't reach the tiller" etc., instead think something like "I want to steer in close quarters without reaching" etc.. Maybe the answer that way is a trolling motor side mounted as bow thruster etc (not that, but the ideas might flow better if you focus more on what you want rather than what you believe is making you not able to do that thing— now you have a goal and can list ways to achieve that goal). This comes from consulting world— give it a shot! (and yes, I know it sounds silly and doesn't always have applicability, but it's a really good exercise IMO)

Does not sound silly to me at all. At this point I am just brainstorming ideas, and seeing what others might have used to resolve a similar goal. The boat is back in the marina now, so I will hold off on my experimenting for a while.

[bruce]

Dave,

Following up on your auxiliary thruster idea, I recalled seeing this new French light-weight, portable longtail motor the other day. Light enough at 11 lbs. to retrieve from storage when needed, the battery is self-contained. 130 cm is shorter than any of my paddles. Oarlock mount easy to customize.
https://defender.com/en_us/temo-450-electric-outboard-motor-temo-450

I wouldn't want another piece of gear to mess with, but YMMV.

[Dave-in-RI]

My idea could be made for $100 (cheap cordless drill + paint stirring bit + nylon prop), but someone made it already for $40, ha, others for $15 (bring your own drill). I'll still stick w/ the paddle, but I'm glad it's proof of concept for the re-defining the problem statement into a possibility statement method. Give this to the wife/kids up front while you fight things at the stern

Example 1


Example 2

Example 3

Example 4