Motoring in reverse

[Martin Bosman]

Since I bought my O'Day 37CC, I am very much negativly impressed by the way she handles in reverse.It must have taken me at least 2 weeks to get a bit of a grip on her behaviour, when mooring, stern-first. The prop. affect from my O'Day is so strong , that you need about 100 yards to get her under controle.The rudder reacts also very late and has no influense what so ever after the boat swing straight away to port.Are there more people who are having experienced this and who are the reactions from them?

 

[Peter Brennan]

Reverse? What reverse?

I am afraid you will just have to live with it. The boat will go in reverse but it is impossible to know where it is going to go. My technique is to give her plenty of throttle in reverse to get her moving, then throttle back and hope the rudder will bite. I alternate this with bursts of forward, enough to kick the boat around with the propeller wash on the rudder but not enough to stop the boat from going in reverse. Takes practice but it will work. Of course, you guys moor stern to while we moor bow to. The main thing is to get close enough to get a line on the dock.

 

[howie]

portways walk

You both got it, walks to port just fine. Only trouble is if you dont want to back that way! I usually give it a good burst in reverse and then go to neutral, keep doing this until you have some rudder control. I've been more than embarrased a coupe of times doing ten point turns in the marina until i got her headed in the right way. And as long as my slip is on the port side it makes it easy to stop and pull her right up to the dock...on port side that is~ Do you both have the standard 11x16 two blade prop? I was wondering if one of the fancy feathering or sail props would help any? howie~

 

[Justin - O'day Owners' Web]

Its just what they do

No inboard sailboat goes astern very well; some are worse than others. The guys have it pretty well covered. I'd only add that you want to keep it slow enough in reverse that blasts of forward over the rudder can stop the boat almost immediately. Justin - O'day Owners' Web

 

[Michael]

like nailing jello to a wall

Yeah terrrrrrrible. Sort of like when you were a kid and hurt yourself in a small way and your mother would say "so don't do that."Honestly use/get a rudder angle indicator and keep mid-ship; (in a marina) run at low rpm, keep in neutral most of the time to keep from going out of control, remember delayed reaction - so "steer in the future" and just slip into gear as you need to go fore and aft. Hope that helps...