It's cool to sail with a balanced rudder.

[Craig Weis]

My old IdaSailor Rudder is balanced. Some of the rudder is under the transom just a bit. Leaving some of the rudder ahead of the hinge. That's the definition of a 'balanced rudder'. And when properly locked down, [fully pulled forward], some of the water flowing past assists in turning the rudder. It's like power steering on the tiller. And the added benefit might be that it becomes easier to turn and control a balanced rudder, saving valuable power inputs from electric driven tiller drives. How cool is that?

We have so much grass in the cut between the Bay of Green Bay and Lake Michigan because the stupid DNR won't allow our grass cutters to cut more then 6 or 9 inches below the surface [they can cut 36inches below the surface] that my rudder constantly kicks up with piles of weeds on it.

No more. I drilled a hole and put in a snowblower shear pin and removed the line used to pull up the rudder. Always hoping for deep water. When under power I can 'reverse' the weeds off till I find deep water.

BTW, our water is about 14 inches more then last year. It's just a cycle. Don't get excited thinking the land is sinking or the ice caps [that are floating and supported in water, hense have zero influence on water flooding NY city, sorry Al Gore]
skip.

[jgalaxie]

fyi...  ice caps are on top of land, ice bergs are floating.  and they do directly influence water levels, just stand near a river bed at the bottom of a snow covered mountain in spring and you'll get the drift (pun intended).  anywho...  i do like the rudder details, any pictures?

[Craig Weis]

No balanced Rudder detail pics in Frappr other then the bearings...two bronze bushing back to back. http://www.frappr.com/?a=myphotos&id=807470

And the US Navy played hide and seek with the Russian Navy under the polar ice caps for years as written about in the book Blind Man's Bluff.

Ice caps are floating in the seas. Yes land also has ice on it.

Side bar bet: Fill a glass up with as much water as it can hold. Then float some ice cubes in it. Ignore the immediate displaced water from the cubes and let the ice cubes met. The ice cubes may float above the rim of the glass. Come back after these melt and the water level in the glass will be below or at the filled glass level with no additional overflow. Melting ice cubes will not overflow the glass. As the ice cubes melt they will contract in displacement. Same weight more space as ice, same weight less space as water.

Interestingly a recently held summer meeting at Cross Roads Nature Interpretation Center in Sturgeon Bay held by our Federal DNR scientists talked and documented a three year long study about about our lake levels [The five Great Lakes].

1~No the water is not 'running out' faster because of what 'man has done in the Detroit area. Those rock bottoms are not eroding. The coffer dams on the bottom of the river had zero effect on water flow.
2~Once covered with the weight of miles of vertical ice, the land is just now rebounding making the water levels appear to be dropping as the land rises. A long time it seems from man's point of view, a nano second in history. Satellite geosynchronous laser measurements bare this out.
3~Levels are with in the normal 25 year cycle.

What weighs more?
A-Air with water vapor in it?
B-Dry air with less or no water vapor in it?

On fair days, why does the barometer [which weighs the weight of air] rise? And fall on stormy days?

skip.

[jgalaxie]

those are some really neat photos.  your boat is beautiful.  and thank you for the diagrams, i've been looking for those for a while, but could not find them.  i've got a 16, but think i can get the drift from yours:)

[NateD]

What do you think of trying to balance the stock flat rudder? It looks like I cut cut away a bit off the top of the blade and it would pivot forward more. What do you think?

[Steve Ullrich]

Nate - I don't think it would make enough of a difference to be noticeable.  As I understand it, roughly 20% of a foiled rudder would be forward of the rudder's pivot line to achieve balance. I don't know what the percentage would need to be for a flat blade...

What do you think of trying to balance the stock flat rudder? It looks like I cut cut away a bit off the top of the blade and it would pivot forward more. What do you think?

[Craig Weis]

If you want to play around with that 20% forward of the rudder post concept then hang around someplace like Palmer Johnson Yachts and ask one of the 'shop rats' if they would give you a piece of 8mm aluminum plate and then on this blank draw the shape you want and ban saw it out. Report back. skip. It will make that tiller effort 'lighter'.
Or not finding the perfect sized blank, a smaller chunk of scrap could be tac welded on to the leading edge of the old rudder blade and tried. If it sails better weld it on permanently, if not snap it off and grind the scars.

[multimedia_smith]

Hi Skip,
Nice Pics... One comment though.  I noticed that you have the nuts on the top of the rudder pintle mount.  When I installed my Ida Rudder, there was some play in the bolt holes... I added a sleeve made from nylon.  Simply a rectangle of thin nylon wrapped around the bolt and cut so it did not overlap.  I inserted it into the hole and forced the bolt along with it... it has eliminated the play and the rudder has a nice solid movement with a slight resistance.  Back to the bolts...
The stainless bolts have the washers as you do where the rudder meets the pintle... I put them in from the top with the nuts on the bottom... Just in case the nuts ever loosen while underway... gravity will work with me and the bolts won't slip out... hate to think about that... Just a thought...  Please excuse my jumping in here, but safety is our primary concern.
Happy Sailing
Dale

[Craig Weis]

Nothing wrong with zerks to shoot grease. Never though about it. I assembled with NeverSeize, and each winter I remove the rudder and store it down stairs.  You guys using stainless steel, a post about ss is in here somewhere.

"Just in case the nuts ever loosen while underway... gravity will work with me and the bolts won't slip out... hate to think about that... Just a thought...  Please excuse my jumping in here, but safety is our primary concern."

I explained this years ago. I want to be able to look over the transom and see if my nuts were tight by noting the amount of threads sticking above the nuts. If they fell off it would be too late, I would not see them loosening up.

Nobody but me likes bronze bushings. Not the factory, not IdaSalor. Something to do with salt water.
skip.

[Bob23]

Aw, Skip:
   I like bronze bushings. How about adding some grease fittings to 'em? I use a locking nut facing down; haven't lost one yet. They stay tight. I grease the bolt every spring with a thick, ugly wad of grease...good old car grease. It keeps everything pretty well lubed all season, but I'm somewhat serious about the grease fittings. Shoot, we got 'em on our outboards, right?
Bob23