please help diagnose lee helm ocean voyager 26

[Tarnacc]

Originally Posted by Kastaway

I don’t know about sticks and rags but that rudder looks like it would leak a bunch of pressure through the prop clearance area. I’m not sure that it would deflect much flow (water mass) at your hull speed and rudder angle. Then again if it behaves under power ok (cutting the power partway through a turn to reduce the effect of the prop accelerating the flow) then maybe you can add rudders to the rags and sticks list that I don’t understand.
Yep - I can see the next post now ........ “add rudders to the list dummy”

Thanks for your comment. This was a picture taken when we launched and the waterline has changed quite significantly since this time and since the start of this thread. As a result, there is quite a bit more rudder in the water now and the prop aperture is deeper in the water. This HAS seen an improvement in performance under power which is something I was not expecting. I suppose the prop was cavitating to some degree and I did not realize it.

In any case, the rudder really is not a problem as it is quite large and has plenty of authority.

[Don C L]

This has really piqued my interest and I am really curious what you find. Keep us posted!

[Dr.No]

Tarnacc,
First off, I still have a file on these boats that I’ve kept for sentimental reasons. It was a great period of life when I was building the last six of these boats. If you PM me with an address, I’ll copy these and send them to you. I have various promotional material which includes a lot of specifications, prices of options, even my old building diagrams and notes. One of the factors with these boats is that they were offered fully built with custom configurations, or as kits in any stage desired for owner completion. To answer your questions:
1) I don’t remember any specific designation of MK 1 or MK 2, but feel certain that the deck mold was never modified. Thus, they all would have had the same headroom. There was a natural evolution with these boats, that they were being tweaked throughout the run.
2) No idea about why there is no Hull #. Bill used to carve it into the aft hull with a Dremel.
3) We installed a BMW D-12 3 cylinder diesel on all of my hulls.
4) These were hand built, custom boats. There was great latitude for minor and major changes. The photos I have show rectangular plastic ports, but we would happily install bronze of any shape if the customer wanted it, and paid for the upgrade.
5) I built galleys on both sides, as well as some very specific custom cabinetry. It was no big deal.
6) I have a promotional photo showing a dolphin striker, and lines drawings that don’t have one.
Yes, the rudder has a very large aperture. If you could close some of that up, it would help. If you could ever go with a folding/feathering prop, you would eliminate a Lot of drag, and increase speed significantly. Cheers!

[TrentePieds]

Quote: "6) I have a promotional photo showing a dolphin striker, and lines drawings that don’t have one.'

I'm sure a lot of us would really appreciate it if you could kindly post the lines drawings. Would that be possible for you?

TrentePieds

[Dr.No]

Hopefully, these help...

[TrentePieds]

Thanx, Dr.No. Very kind of you. In light of the comments I made at the top of this thread, I have, of course, harvested all the pictures I could from HolyMotherNet, so I already have these four. So far, none of them have spoken to the concern I gave expression to, nor are they of sufficient accuracy to employ my suggested methodology, although the first one you posted is quite useful.

You said explicitly that you have LINES DRAWINGS. and that, as you will know, is precisely what we need in order to help Tarnacc with his lee helm problem.

Possibly you have Lines Drawings, but are reluctant to put them on line. If you do have them, you might be willing to furnish a copy directly to Tarnacc since the boat is no longer in production?

TP

[Dr.No]

Right, sorry, but I thought there were actual lines drawings in my 38 year old file. Apparently, I have never had a copy of these, and doubt that anyone besides the naval architect and Bill Randall ever did either. I believe Bill built the plug and the molds. I was getting the drawings mixed up from another series of boats.
Enclosed are a few of my Voyager 26 building notes, which are primarily of the interior build. These are of no help with the Lee helm situation, but are submitted for possible general interest/trivia. I am happy to share any info. These forums have been incredibly instructive to me with the extended refit of my aluminum 53’ Cigale 16 - and I would like to thank everyone for participating. Cheers!

[tanngrisnir]

Hello,

Finally had a chance to see the effect of rake and sailing without the yankee on your lead. Remember this is just one way of getting balance in the ballpark. We are really interested in the effect some change has on lead than the absolute number.



Previously the lead came out to 15.7%. Without the Yankee this drops to 10.1%. This is now on the low side of design lead so we would expect your lee helm to be noticeably reduced as you have described, but it's still not balanced.



Initial calculation assumed a 3 degree rake. Increasing rake to 6 degrees also drops the lead from 15.7% to 11.9%, so a worthwhile change for not a lot of effort.


What would be useful is to measure the current rake, if it is anything less than 3 degrees you have a contribution to the problem. looking at you shrouds, you should be able to add rake by tweaking the lowers, lengthening your forestay, shortening the backstay then try it out.

[carillonator]

I own a 1987 Voyager Mark II, it's the most balanced boat I've ever sailed. Close hauled with all 3 sails up you can let go of the tiller and go do something else, she'll sail a straight line all day. Off the wind a bit of weather helm increasing with the breeze and heel. You have to fight it starting around 18kts or so on a beam reach, which a reef in the main settles down nicely. It can be hard to get the bow through the wind with a strong breeze, even with good boat speed, and especially in a seaway. I suspect this may be an underpowered rudder, but am not sure.


Universal 12 engine. The diesel tank is under the port cockpit locker, batteries directly across on starboard. Fresh water tank under the V-berth, 30' of chain in the forepeak. Lists a little to port with the fuel tank full. Looking at some photos she rides a little bow-high relative to the painted waterline, but with the water tank empty.



Happy to take some measurements for comparison if you'd like.

[Don C L]

Originally Posted by carillonator

I own a 1987 Voyager Mark II, it's the most balanced boat I've ever sailed. Close hauled with all 3 sails up you can let go of the tiller and go do something else, she'll sail a straight line all day. Off the wind a bit of weather helm increasing with the breeze and heel. You have to fight it starting around 18kts or so on a beam reach, which a reef in the main settles down nicely. It can be hard to get the bow through the wind with a strong breeze, even with good boat speed, and especially in a seaway. I suspect this may be an underpowered rudder, but am not sure.


Universal 12 engine. The diesel tank is under the port cockpit locker, batteries directly across on starboard. Fresh water tank under the V-berth, 30' of chain in the forepeak. Lists a little to port with the fuel tank full. Looking at some photos she rides a little bow-high relative to the painted waterline, but with the water tank empty.



Happy to take some measurements for comparison if you'd like.

Thanks! Welcome aboard!

[tanngrisnir]

Originally Posted by carillonator

I own a 1987 Voyager Mark II, it's the most balanced boat I've ever sailed. Close hauled with all 3 sails up you can let go of the tiller and go do something else, she'll sail a straight line all day. Off the wind a bit of weather helm increasing with the breeze and heel. You have to fight it starting around 18kts or so on a beam reach, which a reef in the main settles down nicely. It can be hard to get the bow through the wind with a strong breeze, even with good boat speed, and especially in a seaway. I suspect this may be an underpowered rudder, but am not sure.

Happy to take some measurements for comparison if you'd like.

Hello, Welcome, another data point. And there we were suspecting the design was a dog. I am glad your Voyager sails well, it certainly looks like a lovely traditional mini-ship.



I have been working through a similar balance problem with a small trailer sailor at the moment, the mast is about 10-15cm too far forward. One of the things I noticed while getting to understand the problem was a similar reluctance to tack that you describe. Usually you leave the headsails sheeted as you go about and release them as they blow across, using them to help pull the bow around. In this case, the bow came up very slowly through the wind and often would fall away again overriding the rudder. The remedy was to blow the headsail just before starting the tack and allow the main to assist in bringing the bow up. It would be interesting to see if this works for you.

[Tarnacc]

Bit of an older thread at this point. When I began the discussion I was deep in to solving these issues and had time to deal with it. As often happens, real life got to me and I was pulled away from boat projects in favor of other matters. A private message brought me back and I am excited to see some new information I had missed so I apologize for the absence and thank you for the new insights!

In the last few months I have not been completely idle. I loaded up about 300 to400 lbs worth of old chain, scrap lead and buckets of dirt in to the aft bilge, cockpit and quarterberths. This was in an effort to get her to sit more on what I felt was her proper waterline. We went for a sail and performance was better but still pretty bad. Still could not bring her through the wind. After getting back home I set up a little foundry in the back yard and scavenged up about the same amount of weight in scrap lead and went about melting it in to small bars of around 10 lbs each. The shape and relative small size of the bars allowed me to lay them in to the aft bilge under the prop shaft and thus remove the chain and dirt. I plan to glass them in.

I have also made a new mast step with a 5 degree rake. I have been waiting on a day when the stars align and I have a day off with good weather, no other projects higher on the food chain and a couple of team members to raise the mast and replace the step.

Once the step is in I will report back. To be honest I have not been expecting these changes to solve the problem but have been hopeful that they would get me to "good enough". Some of the recent comments have given me hope that this could do it.

So once again, thank you to all for your comments, insight and advice.

[wingssail]

Originally Posted by Tarnacc

...I have also made a new mast step with a 5 degree rake...

Rocking your mast back 5 degrees could make quite a big difference. You will be moving the tip back over two feet. Considering that more of the area is down low and not moving as much still the total change of the entire mainsail area could be aft around 1 foot.

This might be easily felt.

If it is not enough the next change might be to revise you mainsail to add more leech.

Keep in mind that you will need to lengthen the forestay about 1 foot

[KGarwick]

You have your CE too far forward. Your rig is out of design spec somehow. The easiest way to move the CE (pressure) of your mainsail back significantly is to move your traveler further astern, and ease the forestay to let the mast rock back.

Lots of times folks move stuff on a boat from where designed, completely unaware of the consequences. Your boat's previous owners have made MASSIVE design changes with the powerplant, maybe even forgetting about fuel and transmission weight. If you are falling off with lee helm on every point of sail, your CE is wrong. If you don't fix it you're just placing unwanted wear and stress on your tiller and rudder.

I seriously doubt the lee helm is caused by your bow buying into the water too far. This would result in less keel resistance in the stern with the stern then slipping/crabbing to leeward. Results would likely be weather helm, not lee helm.

Balance the ballast, move all significant weight as close to midships as you can. Move the mainsail CE rearward by moving the traveler. If the traveler is already on the stern of the boat, your mainsail is totally shot and should be recut.

Try sailing with mainsail only. There is little chance that you still have any lee helm without any headsails.

Don't try to move the mast step, you'll only put the boat's structure in jeapordy. The is absolutely NO reason to add a mizzen mast to your Voyager. These are both desperate and drastic measures that you shouldn't even consider.

One last item to consider, are you certain that you have the correct mast?

[KGarwick]

Traveler ought to be on the transom. Did somebody move it in order to install your solar panels?