216 Rudder issue

[Erik Garcia]

I removed my tiller to investigate the rudder cassette in my 216 (which has been hard to turn) and the cassette literally dropped out of the deck mounting! The grey 14" pvc tube, capped on either end by the slotted covers does not appear to be captured within the deck mounting. Is the deck mounting ring supposed to be fixed (epoxied?) to the grey inner tube?

 

[bloomac]

There are long pieces of starboard plastic that compress together to keep the top and bottom of the cassette together. There are screws on either end that hold those pieces in place. If removed, bearings fall everywhere. The cassette should rest on the deck with the stainless steel ring at the top. The PVC tube is not affixed to the boat other than by the stainless ring.

Rudder is problematic. Works fairly nice when sailing but plagued by little annoyances. Too bad I can't put another rudder on the transom!

 

[Erik Garcia]

216 rudder

There are long pieces of starboard plastic that compress together to keep the top and bottom of the cassette together. There are screws on either end that hold those pieces in place. If removed, bearings fall everywhere. The cassette should rest on the deck with the stainless steel ring at the top. The PVC tube is not affixed to the boat other than by the stainless ring.

Rudder is problematic. Works fairly nice when sailing but plagued by little annoyances. Too bad I can't put another rudder on the transom!

Yeah, I called Hunter. They were pretty responsive. The 2004 assembly was "pre- stainless steel ring". I packed the whole thing up and shipped it to Florida for an upgrade.