My Steering is Loose

[rognvald]

Another vote for tiller. It is patently absurd, in my opinion, to have a wheel on a 27 foot boat. Also, be certain you have enough clearance for the tiller head since the rudder shaft is in close proximity to the day tank in the picture. Good luck and safe sailing. P.S. K.I.S.S!

[Cadence]

I will bet you can slack your cables loosen the bolt holding the quadrant, slide it up or down and replace a sheared in half key. JMHO

[TeddyDiver]

+1 for tiller.
A bit of aside of the subject but got a grazy idea of an autopilot, or hammock pilot being more precise. I'm having a hammock in (or over) the cockpit and thought about placing a couple of bungees between the tiller and hammock. Boat heels more and so does the hammock (with me) turning the tiller to lee and vice versa. Should work from beam reach to close hauled

[Kelkara]

Well it may have been a fairly simple fix ...

The Kero tank is out, and isn't going back, And I've opened up the access to the quadrant.

There were two bolts that were a bit loose ... so I tightened them up, and it seemed to fix the problem. If I've understood things correctly these should be set-screws that engage dimples in the rudder-post to hold the quadrant in place. Does that seem reasonable? or have I just masked the symptons by tightening up something unrelated?

So it looks like the wheel is getting a reprieve for now. Although I'm still keen on the idea of going back to a tiller ... so I'm keen to continue that discussion. But hopefully now I can sail the boat while I plan out what needs to be done in a more relaxed timeframe.

[TeddyDiver]

Originally Posted by Kelkara

Well it may have been a fairly simple fix ...

The Kero tank is out, and isn't going back, And I've opened up the access to the quadrant.

There were two bolts that were a bit loose ... so I tightened them up, and it seemed to fix the problem. If I've understood things correctly these should be set-screws that engage dimples in the rudder-post to hold the quadrant in place. Does that seem reasonable? or have I just masked the symptons by tightening up something unrelated?

Yup! right screws

[tkeithlu]

It's possible with two set screws that the builder did not drill dimples in the rudder stock to match the screws. That's half-baked engineering for a critical system. My recommendation is that you replace the bolts with set screws (the black ones with Allen wrench female heads), since they have machined points made to maximize grip on the shaft. I also recommend that you set them in Loctite - if they worked loose once, they can do it again.

[jimbunyard]

Originally Posted by Kelkara

Well it may have been a fairly simple fix ...

The Kero tank is out, and isn't going back, And I've opened up the access to the quadrant.

There were two bolts that were a bit loose ... so I tightened them up, and it seemed to fix the problem. If I've understood things correctly these should be set-screws that engage dimples in the rudder-post to hold the quadrant in place. Does that seem reasonable? or have I just masked the symptons by tightening up something unrelated?

So it looks like the wheel is getting a reprieve for now. Although I'm still keen on the idea of going back to a tiller ... so I'm keen to continue that discussion. But hopefully now I can sail the boat while I plan out what needs to be done in a more relaxed timeframe.

As addressed, the fix is likely temporary.

The more correct way would be to loosen the two bolts circled in red below, remove the bolt (there may be two) circled in yellow, clean the clamping slot with a hacksaw blade, then re-clamp the quadrant starting with re-installing and tightening the bolt(s) marked in yellow and then moving to the 'locating' bolts marked in red.

It is likely that there are no 'dimples' drilled into the rudder shaft. As recommended above, cup headed set screws will work better, but if you get socket head set screws that disappear into the hub when you tighten them that's asking for a whole nuther set of problems. Better in my mind to just sharpen a point on to the existing bolt...the main force holding the quad to the shaft is the clamping provided by the split flange.


And don't forget to neversieze both the clamping and locating bolts when you reassemble. Stainless in aluminum dry in that location is almost guaranteed to corrode into place permanently...

I'm with most others in eventually going to a tiller though...

[jimbunyard]

Too late to add by 'edit', but properly tightened bolts or set screws in this application should remain tight...if eventual loosening is a worry, bolts (or long set screws) are available with holes drilled for safety wiring, or they can be easily enough drilled in situ or on the bench.