Terry and Travis
Terry,
I’m sorry to hear it wasn’t a simple swap. The best laid plans of mice and men, right?? Its always a little frustrating when responsibly planned, carefully executed maintenance projects cause hastily planned reluctantly executed ones.
But it sounds like you’ve got a good handle on it. I’d do the same thing; shave down and rebuild the trailing edge of the skeg as opposed to the rudder. 6 tubes of West Six10 epoxy and a generous amount of that thick mat fiberglass would probably do the trick. In that area, you could probably get away with just Bondo alone frankly, but...yeah the other way is better. I’d love to see some photos of what you find in the skeg, and of the process in general.
Best of luck!
I also bought a rudder for my 384 from Foss. I thought you might be interested in my experience as well as your own.
My old rudder was waterlogged and seemed to drain out after drilling drainholes at the bottom. After a lightening hit, the rudder had several chunks of fiberglass blown off, so I figured it was time to replace.
It is close enough to take a drive to Foss and see their operation. Almost all of their molds were lying outside on the grass and the 384 mold looked pretty beat up, but serviceable.
When I picked up the new rudder, I was impressed at how well it looked - nicely faired and with a good 5200 seal on the shaft. They said that it was good that I brought the old one back when I did. The internal anti-rotation plate was a sheet of 3/8" carbon steel, and had been stitch welded to the shaft with, I think, 6 beads, each about 1-1/2" long. All but one bead were corroded thru and failure was imminent. They replaced the old plate with four pairs of 1/8 x 1" stainless strips, each pair spread apart and welded to the port and starboard sides of the stock at one end and the aft end welded together, forming a long triangle. The strip triangles were placed about 8" apart along the stock.
When I first tried to test fit the rudder, I discovered that the stock was offset to one side about 1/4". Took it back to Foss and they fixed it, but don't know how it was done. Looked great, and it now fit, except it rubbed on the hull at the top where the trailing edge curves aft of the stuffing box on both sides. At least, it was symmetrical! Had to grind off some meat from the hull there, and it just clears now.
Like yours my skeg was not symmetrical either, and rubbed on several areas. After starting the grinding job, I found that the skeg had about a quart of water inside, . Also, the inside of the skeg was partially hollow, not nearly filled with the resin/micro-balloon mixture shown on the hull laminating plan. There was also a crack in the hull seam area just below the cutless bearing housing, so might have been the culprit in the leak act, or at least contributed to it. Additionally, found that the gudgeon bolt holes were oversized and off center, angled to keep the rudder straight. The holes were filled with 5200. All of this had to be realigned, re-faired, bolt holes glassed in again, sealed and epoxy coated. You might not need to do that much, and I hope that you don't. Took several weeks to fix.
