aving removed the painted aluminum strip which runs from port to starboard side at the top of the transom for painting, I noticed outward movement at the top of the transom when applying downwards pressure to the rudder stock. Viewing this area from inside the yacht, I was able to see that the cock pit/transom butting edges had only been bonded together in the centre of the transom approximately one meter across with bog adhesive. Someone had previously tried to fix this by what looked like throwing pieces of fibreglass at it.

I had it repaired at a fiberglass shop for $120, the bog was shaped to a curved surface and the transom/deck fibreglass surface roughed up. Three layers of fiberglass were applied.

The end result is one very strong transom joint. Again this should be repaired to prevent future problems arising and I have seen several Farrs with this problem since discovering mine. This problem can occur due to the weight of the rudder when travelling long distances on the road, so best to remove the rudder for those long trips.

The aluminum sheave had seized to the rudders stainless steel bolt and upon trying to remove it after soaking with anti rust, the rudder hole was unfortunately elongated while trying to punch the bolt out.

In hindsight I should have carefully hack sawed the bolt with a fine blade between the rudder stock and rudder, removing it that way.</p>\r\n<p>The rudder was secured to the drill press table [ difficult as it is curved ] and the rudder bolt hole was drilled out to a 27mm diameter on the drill press. A 316 stainless steel 25mm shaft was centre drilled to incorporate a new rudder pivot bolt. The outside diameter of the shaft was knelled for external grip to improve glue adhesion. The shaft was then glued into position in the rudder with epoxy glue.

The rudder stock bolt holes were worn so a set of engineering reamers were used to enlarge the holes to accommodate x2 spacers with flanges which were machined from a free machining aluminum rod. The spacers were located to the rudder stock with two small S/S screws per side and then the rudder stock was painted.

Unfortunately it was only after I had finished doing this work to the rudder stock that I learned of the following. You can significantly reduce the amount of heavy helm on the tiller handle when sailing by redrilling and mounting the rudder pivot bolt forward by 25mm. This allows the rudder to hang in a true vertical position when down.