Skeg attached! Minor Milestone

One of the tasks I have to get out of the way before I can move onto the rest of the drive train is setting the skeg. The skeg is a single piece of very heavy walled Stainless Steel channel. Almost 6 feet long and weights about 60 lbs.

Skeg fitted into place!

This will be the first piece of equipment actually bolted to the boat. A small milestone. No epoxy or sanding involved! :-)

Backing plate in place

I couldn't find the exact length bolts I needed to hold the skeg in place so I made my own out of SS All Thread and some nuts. Yes, I actually welded these together myself. No Grinding Involved! :-)

Lead weights holding backing plate & wrench in place

This really was a two man job but with numerous trips up and down the ladder I managed to do it myself. Using a big chunk of lead to hold the backing plate & bolt in place while I shifted the skeg into place and put the washer/nut on below.

Wiggling & wedging into place

It took some work to get the holes lined up. The tolerances are pretty tight. Five or six trips up and down and I got them lined up enough to get the bolts through the wedge and the skeg.

Bolted in! Yeah!

Once I got it in I checked it for level etc.

Fore & Aft - Perfect

Using my mockup shaft I slid it down into the pintle bearing to see how the shaft lined up.

Perfectly plumb!

And lastly side to side. Right on the money!

I do have a wee bit of a problem with the rudder stock hole I cut earlier. Dunno where I went wrong but it's out about 5/8". Ooops!

Plumb is resting on edge of pintle hole.

Not a big deal. I can handle it. All in a days work.

That's about it for now. A few more bolts to get in and I shouldn't have to remove or touch it again! It's been a very long time coming to this point. Thanks for following along. I appreciate it.

Standby.

Just in case you missed it on Youtube I did a FAQ's video.