I see that my 53/57 cruising catamaran now in the South Pacific, the Lil Explorers, has trashed a rudder. I understand they have done a repair by now. It looks in the picture like it absorbed a lot of kinetic energy. Note to future self. Keep the board down deeper than the rudder at all times. Its much easier to fix.
That was a 3″ OD shaft with .75″ wall on the plans. It moved. You wonder why I shake my head at those other designers who think 1/8″ wall is fine? My boats are designed to dry out on a tide flat with no rudder damage.
I feel the same way about transom hung. I haven’t had any problems with my rudder, but I do wonder about the thing. Also, transom hung opens up a fair bit of lost space. On the other hand there isn’t any reason why you can’t transom hang a rudder from the cartridge. Obviously the worst of both worlds in a way, but it is a quick repair option if you can’t get to the fancy metal and all that when you experience a problem, or if you want that kind of rudder with possible later replacement for club sailing.
Good argument for kick up transom hung rudders! If they are hydrodynamically efficient enough for Open 60’s they should be good enough for us cruising folks.
Interesting comparison to the rudder stocks that caused the abandonment of the Alpha 2 after it merely slid down a wave backwards.
Major Pain! If they are close to Raiatea (French Polynesia) they can get it fixed there. Next place would be Pago Pago to get one shipped from the weekly container ship from San Diego (takes about a month). Other options are air shipments from NZ but it gets complicated.
Most French Islands have Ateliers de Meries (City Hall Fabricators) that can do decent metal fabrication to get some patch.