New e-rudder

I was never able to mount the Scanmar emergency rudder on the back of the boat anywhere except at the docks. The problem is the high, flat transom of the J/42 that made it difficult to swing the rudder into position, the backstay, which got in the way, and the stern pushpit railing, which also got in the way. You were forced to drop the rudder straight down and then, with the thing wildly bouncing around, line up four tubes with four brackets, then put a pin in each one. It takes flat calm conditions, or a dinghy, to pull that off!

So, I took advantage of the low Canadian dollar and ordered a cassette-style e-rudder from Phil's Foils. With cassette rudders, rather than trying to attach a whole rudder frame to the boat, you need only attach the cassette, which is much easier to handle. Once it's in place, then you slide the blade into it.

Made out of carbon-fiber on a wood core, it is a fraction of the weight of the old rudder, and much easier to handle.

Yesterday, my buddy Allen and I mocked up a frame out of 2x2s. Allen's friend Steve wandered by and made a terrific suggestion of how we could reuse the existing brackets from the Scanmar rudder to hold the frame. This will save me a couple of days of crawling around the lazarette installing new brackets.

Here's what we came up with:

Wooden frame to hold the cassette. In the final steel version, the horizontal posts holding the cassette will be reinforced with some braces. Depending on how tough it is to weld the compound joint, we may even do away with the post completely and rely solely on the braces. The foil is not pushed down all the way.

This is the last major project before heading south to California for the Pacific Cup.