Gail. The brackets on the transom, called gudgeons, haven't changed. The rudder assembly lifts off by removing the hairpin cotter pins from the lower part of the pintels. With the pins out the rudder assembly lifts off. The mast crutch assembly is held to the rudder by a pin that is also held in place by a hairpin cotter. Remove the hairpin, remove the pin and the mast crutch lifts up and out of the rudder's vertical square tube. This is also how you change the mast crutch height from trailering setting to mast raising/lowering setting. As I wrote before the rudder assembly must stay in place for trailering as it is what holds the mast crutch. :: Dave Scobie :: M6'8" #650 :: SV SWALLOW - sv-swallow.com :: former owner M17 #375 SWEET PEA - m17-375.com :: former owner M15 #288 SCRED - m15namedscred.wordpress.com <<-- new site! On Tue, Feb 2, 2021, 3:30 PM Gail Russell <gail@zeliga.com> wrote:
I do not believe I still have the mast crutch showing in Bob's delivery picture. The current one is definitely mounted to the rudder assembly, and the rudder assembly is mounted on three triangular brackets. From what I can tell, the brackets showing on Bob's picture are rectangular, but I am not certain. I can certainly see, though, that one would not want to be changing out those brackets on the hull without a good reason. The mounting points for the current mast crutch are different than Bob's picture.
My husband swore the rudder just lifted off until I took him out to have him show me how it is done. He changed his mind. :)
It looks like I could take the tiller assembly off, but it would be a bit of a mess because the same pin goes through the mast assembly. Think I will pass on that.
Gail
That photo Bob shared shows the original crutch on Hydeaway II. NOTHING
on the transom was changed to use the RudderCraft rudder & mast crutch. Do
you still have the crutch showing in the picture?
The RudderCraft system is, as Bob worte, meant to stay in place at all times. It is designed to do that. The upper portion of the RudderCraft system, the mast crutch, is removed after the mast is raised (and put back in place for when the mast is lowered.
:: Dave Scobie :: SV SWALLOW - https://sv-swallow.com :: Montgomery 6'8" #650 :: Truck camper - https://truckpopupcamper.wordpress.com/ :: Ramblings - https://scoobsramblings.wordpress.com/ :: former M17 owner #375 SWEET PEA - https://m17-375.com/ <http://www.m17-375.webs.com/> :: former M15 owner #288 - http://www.freewebs.com/m15-name-scred