1984 DS II Centerboard stuck in Up position

[dave24]

Greetings - 1st post.

I have owned this Daysailer II for about 15 years and it has been a great boat. I have it moored on a tidal bay in Maine, and this may be contributing to the issue I've recently experienced with my centerboard. Once this year, and once last year, the centerboard would not go down. When this occured last summer, I pulled the boat on its side at low tide and was able to easily pull the board down by hand - I was surprised how easily it dropped as it was totally stuck when the boat was in the water. It seemed to work ok after that.

But, it happened again this past weekend and I would like to fix this problem. I read a few posts which mentioned a centerboard 'down line'. My boat only has a line to raise the centerboard. To lower it, I have just uncleated this line and down she would go (except these 2 instances).

So, I am hoping some of you may have experieced something similar and come up with a good solution to share.

Happy sailing!
Dave

 

[Jackdaw]

In the water, an unweighted centerboard (like on the DS) is almost buoyancy neutral. Any grunge in the locker or on the board can foul it to the point that it will stick. A bigger problem would be the board splitting and swelling with water.

 

[Captbaker]

CENTER BOARD Recomendations

Dave:

I have a down haul cable for my day sailor II which helps greatly and is what I ultimately recommend you installing. For instructions, I can help you because I had to re-install mine twice because of the "CB stick problems." Now if you don't want to do this just yet. Then take the CB out and put high temp gear grease in and around the bolt hole. Use liberal amounts on the board itself where ever it makes contact with the CB well.

Bobby

 

[dave24]

down haul cable

Bobby, I would be interested in investigating how to install this. Are there instructions anywhere on this site? And in the short-term, I will try the grease.

Dave

 

[Sunbird22358]

All years of the DS II came from the factory with both the upline and downline for the CB. So, it is just a matter of restoring what was originally there. I don't have a good pic of the CB rigging on a 1984 model, but the pics of my 1979 model should be close enough (basic rigging of CB did not change)

 

[dave24]

Sunbird, thank you for this fantastic information. I'm anxious to get back up to Maine in 2 weeks and try and get this sorted out.