Bavaria rudder quadrant

[Foxy]

This happened a couple of years ago and I had forgotten about it, however a similar incident last week prompted me to write about both (see next post).
Now before anyone accuses me of Bavaria Bashing, this could happen on any similar set up. I was teaching on a Bavaria at the time and thus.....etc

We were downwind sailing in a F8 - only in the Solent - big waves and lots of fun for the students. About a mile west of the forts, one of the team was, unusually, making a real hash of steering, so I asked for the helm only to find the rudder only operating between Stbd and REALLY stbd. Given our proximity to shipping lane and Ryde sands, we were in a bit of a pickle. To cut a long story short, in the rough weather, the quadrant had slipped on the shaft so it could only make a quarter turn before hitting the hull. Normally, this is prevented by a set screw into a dimple on the shaft, however following recent maintenance, this had not been relocated correctly.
We managed to wrench the shaft back to position with three big blokes and the emergency tiller (we had tied the quadrant off to one side, no allen keys on board to move it!!)

The easy corrective action that we decided on afterwards was to drill the 'dimple' through into the shaft so it located more positively as it is really hard to tell if its locked under normal circumstances. Might be worth thinking about if you have to drop the rudder at any time. (which incidentally, is easily possible with the boat in the water)

Hope this helps.

Patrick
www.yachtfoxglove.com

 

[Gypsy]

Limited Rudder

Nasty surprise I am sure. What size/year Bav was it. My B44 2002 has the quadrant keyed to the shaft, maybe smaller models didn't /don't. In any event a fast 3 man fix was obviously needed.

It reminds me of a yacht I saw having trouble approaching an anchorage and doing more reversing than forward after the sails were down. I was nearby in my dinghy and asked about his problem. "Steering, maybe autopilot stuck, bl**dy Turkish maintenance!" he says. Later when I spoke to him he told me it only needed a 'one man fix'. That was the guy who went into the lazarette to find various bags which had been stowed there had moved and jammed between the quadrant and other obstacles to limit the rudder range and keep it offset by about 30deg. He was relieved at the simple solution.

 

[Foxy]

Hopeless I know but cant remember - school has 36, 37, 38 and 44. It def wasn't the 44 (my fave Bavaria to sail, seems in a different class entirely to the others). It would have been about 2004/5 boat I guess.

 

[caleroific]

Hopeless I know but cant remember - school has 36, 37, 38 and 44. It def wasn't the 44 (my fave Bavaria to sail, seems in a different class entirely to the others). It would have been about 2004/5 boat I guess.

I know this is an old thread but I have recently experienced exactly this problem on my 2002 Bavaria 34 when I noticed that when I was steering in a straight line my Wheel midship marker and autopilot rudder indicator were showing a rudder angle of 10 degrees to port. This was after a blustery sail from Poole to Weymouth when the boat was occasionally overpowered and turned into wind with the helmsman fighting the weather helm and exerting significant pressure on the rudder.

Inspection of my rudder stock assembly below decks showed that my wheel quadrant had slipped on the rudder stock. The Raymarine auto pilot has its own ram but the rudder reference is attached to the quadrant so that explained why the autopilot thought it was out of alignment.

My question is whether it was OK to drill the rudder stock to solve this problem and therefore provide a key/indent for the locking bolt to locate or is there another solution? Has anybody else experience this problem and how did they solve it.

I notice that on most Bavaria yachts built since the rudder stock has a vertical key which locates in a keyway in the quadrant - not on my Bavaria 34 unfortunately.

 

[Yngmar]

On our 40 Ocean from 2001 the key is on the quadrant and goes into a keyway on the rudder post. Should be possible to retrofit, if you're quite certain there isn't any other mechanism to keep the quadrant from slipping.

You may also be interested in the Bavaria forums: http://bavariayacht.org/

 

[RichardS]

Machining a keyway in situ would be problematic, I assume?

My rudders arms clamp onto the stock but then have a long M8 bolt and nut (it might be M10) which goes right through the clamp and stock. This could, presumably, be drilled in situ?

Richard

 

[Iain C]

I noticed a problem on my 2004 B32 very soon after I bought her, basically I nearly hit another boat whilst trying to turn in a fairly tight spot. The quadrant was way out of alignment, so I could turn tight to stbd but not only in a big lazy arc to port! I just re-centred it, did the bolts up really tight and it's been absolutely fine since.

 

[Yngmar]

Machining one of the shape shown above in place would be tricky, but you can probably do a woodruff keyway in situ.

 

[Ruffles]

I hate set screws! I always end up having to grind down an oversize key to get them out.

Suggest replace with bold asap!

 

[RichardS]

I hate set screws! I always end up having to grind down an oversize key to get them out.

Suggest replace with bold asap!

Done! :encouragement:

Richard

 

[rogerthebodger]

Using a dimpled setscrew to transmit the steering torque from the quadrant to the rudder shaft is in my view not very good engineering.

With this type of arrangement I wonder how and emergency tiller would be attached.

Mine has a machined square for the emergency tiller to attach. This square also has the quadrant connected leaving and section of the square for emergency tiller.

A rough square could be "machined" with a small angle grinder in position if desperate.

Through bolting is possible but does weaken the rudder shaft in torsion.