Been reading your story about rudder bearings. Wish I had seen it before I started. My problem is the rudder is so tight it takes a man and a boy to turn. I replaced cables but after disconnecting the quadrants realized the bearings in the port side are frozen. I removed the cables and quadrant and the horizontal bolts that rides on the delrin(?). Is there any other keepers. I then tried hitting the top of the shaft but only moved it about 1.5 inches then it became really stuck. I was using a 8# slapper with a 2by4 so stopped because I assumed there had to be something else holding the rudder. Finally using a hand billy to pull the shaft back up and put it back together. So no fix.
Is the horizontal bolt the only thing holding the rudder in the boat? I have a 42

would appreciate your thoughts.