On Friday 11 May 2007 10:10, Doug wrote: > Paddlewise paddling people: > > My wife would like me to add a rudder to her kayak. There is currently > no hardware for mounting one. I'm trying to decide between doing an end > poor and bolting on a rudder, such as this model: > http://secure.seawardkayaks.com/ecbuilder/item177.htm (et cetera) First, the flow over the back end is very turbulent, so whichever method, the drag is little to worry about, but the method above seems nice! Let persume her kayak is glass/polyester, or glass/epoxy! And that is very difficult to reach the extreme end from the inside - no hatch from which you can reach the extreme tail end. If you can, you might be able to feel how thick the glass/plastic is - my first kayak's skin was very thick there so I just cut the extreme rear end off! In either case, whichever type of rudder you eventually choose, I would, if the skin is thin, fill the rear end of the kayak with epoxy (hold the kayak vertically and just pour in)! Then, tape the rear end of the kayak with masking tape, before sawing off the extreme end, to avoid chipping the gelcoat. Take care to get the surface vertical and at right angles to the length of the boat. Looks prettier that way! Now hold the rudder bracket in place, and mark where one of the holes should be and drill the hole (just slightly smaller than the screws you plan to use). Again, if the can reach the tail end comfortably, I would plan to use normal SS bolts and ditto NyLoc nuts; if not, I'd use selftapping screws, that I before screwing them in dipped in epoxy, before I screwed them in the ultimate time. As usual, I would drill one hole, attach the rudder bracket, to see that everything looks OK, mark the next, drill that, and so on, to ensure that it everything is perfectly (or as perfectly as can be), before the next hole, and so on! And I would use heftier bolts/screws in the two upper holes! just my 2c, Tord *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Sat May 12 2007 - 02:33:29 PDT
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