Jaguar 21 keel won't go down

[Avocet]

Is anyone familiar with the Jaguar 21 lift keep arrangements? (A late model, apparently. Early 1990s, maybe). A mate of mine has just bought a second hand one that's been out of the water for a couple of years. He tried lowering the keel today, but it hits some kind of obstruction after about 8".

The lifting arrangement looks simple enough, there's a mechanical "trailer-type" winch on the back of the keel housing, with a webbing strap coming off the drum and going through a slot in the top off the keel housing. It passes over a couple of rollers, and goes down to a shackle on a ring bolt in the top of the keel. The keel slides down relatively freely for about 200mm of webbing payout, and then there's a thud, and the webbing goes slack. Repeated raising and lowering stops it at the same point each time. If it had been a big lump of rust, I'd have expected it not to bee quite such a hard stop? More of a sort of grinding stop? I don't know what the underside of the boat looks like, and it's in the water now.

 

[William_H]

If it is like my 21ft (vertical) lift keel it is very fussy re level of the boat. ie stern heavy it will jamb when going down as the keel jambs in the slot where the trailing edge of keel fits. Likewise nose down the keel can jamb on the front curved part of slot. I actually fitted a little spirit level inside stern locker to enable me to get trim right when dropping keel. Not quite so critical is roll trim. But just be careful.
I set up the spirit level when she was on trailer where I could adjust the trim and see down the cb case to get cb (keel) central to hole while it dangles on lifting tackle. 4 purchase rope to halyard winch.
I have an arrangement of pulling the boat back on the trailer to clear the structure of trialer for the keel to drop. About half way down with trailer jacked up by 15 cms or so. Enables me to paint anti fouling paint on bottom half and paint top half when up from in cabin.
I leave keel down all season.
Of course being a boat neglected for some years your friend's could simply be rust or fouling. Might have sue some sort of jack and blocks to force keel down. ol'will

 

[Refueler]

This boat like many others is prone to crud / stones etc getting jammed up in the keel box. Even barnacle colonies if left on mooring for length of time ... then later if keel not used onshore - they dry out - die but the 'husks' are still there ...

Just two of the many possibles ...

 

[Avocet]

Thanks both. Anyone on here have any experience of that particular model, please? (Just in case there's something peculiar to Jaguars). Am I right in thinking the Parker 21 was basically the same boat?

 

[cid]

OK. I had one of these many years ago, so although a made great use of the lifting keel , I might be a little unsure. 1. the keel swings on a large bar bolted on to hull.( more on this later). 2. Its usual for its own weight to drop down and the winch would spin freely. "3.the one I had was fitted with a stainless steel cable. 4. The tube through which the lifting strop went had a plumb shaped object at its base to stop the cable rubbing against the hull. So far so good. Your problem might be 1 your strop could be snagging at the exit. 2. the fitting to which the strop is attached to the keel could be also snagging .3. fouling on the forward top end of keel rubbing against the keel box. 4. stones found their way into the keel box. You most likely will need the boat out of the water with room to un bolt the retaining bolts to drop the keel down a bit an allow you inspect the strop attachment and the possibility of foul matter.
Now back to the keel bolts. My boat had fittings that looked like those used for holding the axel on a builders wheel barrow. Yes a wheel barrow. the curved section fitted into the shape of the hull and were retained by 4 bolts. The heads were in bedded into the shape of the hull. When I undid these I found they could swivel around . Not a great system. I know of one boat had the keel break off. So my advice is to fit bolts through the hull with a backing plate on the inside. I went on to keep my boat for many years and had great enjoyment and saw it carry on for years .

 

[adokh]

Is anyone familiar with the Jaguar 21 lift keep arrangements? (A late model, apparently. Early 1990s, maybe). A mate of mine has just bought a second hand one that's been out of the water for a couple of years. He tried lowering the keel today, but it hits some kind of obstruction after about 8".

The lifting arrangement looks simple enough, there's a mechanical "trailer-type" winch on the back of the keel housing, with a webbing strap coming off the drum and going through a slot in the top off the keel housing. It passes over a couple of rollers, and goes down to a shackle on a ring bolt in the top of the keel. The keel slides down relatively freely for about 200mm of webbing payout, and then there's a thud, and the webbing goes slack. Repeated raising and lowering stops it at the same point each time. If it had been a big lump of rust, I'd have expected it not to bee quite such a hard stop? More of a sort of grinding stop? I don't know what the underside of the boat looks like, and it's in the water now.

Hello Avocet,
I just got a jaguar 21 1984 and had the same problem while it was still on land. Solved by someone grabbing it from under and giving it a good shake while i was holding the winch prevent a free drop.
I guess that it was stuck because of the 2 blocks that stops it at the end where rubbing on the fiber housing.

Hope it helps and best of luck