On November 28, 2008, Thanksgiving weekend, we prepared for a nice sail with some friends and Harry's daughter Kelly. Unfortunately, the day ended abruptly when, while navigating through the center of the channel at John's Pass, we suddenly lost steering.   Fortunately, we were heading straight, so we went about half a mile past the sea buoy and dropped the hook. We began checking everything to see why the steering was jammed.  Our friend Aloha was crazy enough to jump into the cold water and check for crab traps jammed in the rudder – but no luck. We disconnected the auto pilot, followed the steering cables from the wheel to the steering quadrant. - still no luck...we had to be towed in. Oddly enough, within 30 minutes of us losing steering through John's Pass, another sailboat lost its rudder. This lead us to believe there was something wrong with the channel.




We contacted the other towed boat the next day and found out that he had hit bottom in the middle of the channel and completely lost his rudder. He said he saw his depth sounder go from 12 feet (chart reading) to 5 feet in a second and he draws 6 feet. Totally ripped his rudder off!  We did not think this was our problem because we never felt anything. Nonetheless, Harry put his wet suit on and went over the side to check out the rudder.  He found that our rudder was jammed into the hull of the boat and the rudder post was ripped out of the rudder.  He tried to move the rudder but it would not budge an inch. It appeared that although we felt nothing, we definitely hit bottom in the middle of the channel and that was the cause of our problems.


   

Once the post was knocked down about 6 inches, it wouldn't seem do go any further, so we had to cut the stuffing box with a grinder to relieve pressure from where the rudder post had been bent. Finally, after the final whack – and this thing fought us all of the way down to the final whack – the rudder post let go and the rudder dropped.  Our diver, who was patiently waiting under the boat, immediately hammered a wooden plug into the hole from beneath the boat so we would always have the water pressure forcing it upward.

In this photo you can see the very top of the rudder post stuck in the stuffing box which was cut open to relieve pressure.

We had floats already tied to the rudder and post. Our diver simply swam it over to the floating docks and we pulled it up for observation.

Our diver, Rodney, floats the damaged rudder to the dock.

Harry inspects the damage to the rudder.

This picture shows how the rudder post was bent and ripped away from the rudder.

Damaged Rudder

Internal stainless steel reinforcements are oriented horizontally to the post for the greatest torque transfer, tabbing welded vertically is much weaker.

Vacuum bagging the rudder skins increase tensile strength of the core/skin bond, a failure of this bond leads to rudder failure.

All-stainless internal post and web structure which is then electropolished to prevent future corrosion. Cheaper rudders will use mild steel welded to stainless rudder post.

Wrapped fiberglass layup over shaped cores prevent the secondary bond failure between molded rudder halves that is often the source of water intrusion and eventual rudder failure.

Finished rudder.

More information about Gypsy Wind:

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