Quadrant area, discharge ports, and strength.

[monocerosin]

Monoceros Hunter 37c hull#52 1979


First image, the gear is just sitting there for the photo. This gear and bracket around the rudder post seems removable, would these parts be valuable to anyone? We are mounting an Aries Windvane and will not need this gear for autopilot, I should just remove it right?
Second picture, this old board was screwed in to place these garbage stops on so I removed it. Will replace with a 2x4 that spans the whole area and flatten it out. The sag means the boards that were there as kind of a cover/shelf don't fit at all. Trying to add rigity and make a more flat lip for a shelf to sit on better.
Anyone else deal with this area and have advice?

 

[Jim Legere]

That geared quadrant for the autopilot is neat - never seen one before. It's got to be worth something to the right someone. As far as the "old board" goes, this was length of rusty 2" angle iron on my boat. I replaced it with a piece of aluminum angle. The vertical face acted as the rudder stop. I tapped the horizontal face for machine screws that held a half-moon cover that closed the space above the Edson Radial Drive (quadrant). If you ignore the Jean de Sud wind vane gear and the tiller pilot in this picture, you can sort of see what I'm talking about.