Saving Your Rudder

Many a San Juan 21 sailors have done it. Even the best of them. What is it?? Forget to take the rudder before pulling the boat out of the water! Usually you don't know you did this until you hear people trying to get your attention on the ramp. There is usually a loud grinding noise.

Tip: When you dock and have secured the boat, the very first thing you should do is REMOVE the rudder.

Here are some photos of a Fleet 1 rudder that ate ramp concrete in Lake Sammamish. Both pintles were severely bent. The transom was recently rebuilt and has at least 1" fender washers on the inside of the boat backing the Gudgeons. That combined with the lightweight pintles likely helped to save the transom. Another Fleet 1 boat has some mismatched gel coat around the lower gudgeon indicated it had a repair job there in the past. Likely due to a similar miss hap.

The bowing is caused by a piece of "core" that somehow cracked off and was shoved up and in between the core and skin of the rudder.