Team Seacats

I managed to shape out a rudder to a Naca 63-010 foil shape and it looks incredible!  Unfortunately, the batteries for our camera are dead and neither Bonnie or I can find the stinking charger.  I’m sure I left it somewhere strange.

I started with a nice dry piece of dimensionally stable mahogany and cut out the profile with my band saw.  I then sanded all the edges nice and flat and ran the pieces through the table saw to end up with a thickness just over 3/16″.  After firmly marking the deepest width of the foil (based on the computer model) and marking the center of the leading and trailing edges, I then mounted a hand-held belt sander (with a nice long flat bed) upside-down to my workbench and started gently working the piece to shape.  I must say, the result was exceptional and very very close to the design model.  I’ve put some primer on it and will sort out a way to insert the rudder shaft straight and square as per the design parameters over the weekend.  Once that’s done, I’ll paint, sand, clearcoat, and build a mold from this plug.  It’s a very high aspect ratio rudder that should easily be able to dig in at the most extreme angles of heal that is very straight, true, and fair….damn, I wish that camera were operational!