Problems with rudder cam tension

I've always had a hard time adjusting the cam tension. I purchased two new cam kits about 3 years ago. Even though they are three years old they've probably only been cycled 25-30 times. They worked okay for a very short while, but especially the left side, I could never get enough tension on it before I ran out of adjustment, it was popping loose at random. I just tried adjusting again and same thing, I just can't get it to hold. I've tried stretching the spring and shimming to make it tighter, which helped, but still, the problem remains. Out of desperation, I tried to grind the cam leading edge & radius to be more aggressive. This helped tremendously, but then the problem is, it will randomly not have the correct angle to start pushing the plunger down, essentially locking it in place, I have to force it loose. Last night it sheared off the top of the plunger, so that's a no-go. I now have new plungers and cams, am I missing something obvious here?

Sounds to me like the adjuster plate in the upper casting is not set correctly. If it is pushed too far forward, then the cam won’t be able to rotate fully to lock the plunger into the cam detent. The rudder will feel like it’s locked down, but it will require much less force to unlock.

Assuming that you have adjustable rudder castings, the proper way to adjust the cam slider plate is to loosen the cam plate bolt and slide the cam plate aft. Then rotate the cam to the locked position. Put the rudder blade down and push it all the way forward against the lower casting. Then put the upper casting/tiller arm down and slide the cam plate all the way forward into the cam and tighten the bolt to secure the plate.

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Well, I got it fixed somehow, finally after owning this boat for 4 years, lol. I don't really know how. I think there must be some strange anomaly with the casting. I looked over it thoroughly, nothing obvious. The upper casting sits higher than normal when it's in the latched position... no clue if this is an indicator that something is off or not, and it's not much, but noticeable. Anyway, I was in a time crunch so I just made new cams and plungers out of a couple different types of plastic. I messed with the one cam for hours before I got fed up and just decided to swap sides, knowing that the starboard side was good, I figured I'd see if the problem followed to the other side or stayed on the port side. To my surprise, they both latched positively, rudders have no slop, and I was able to tension properly. Strange.


To address your thoughts. I did try adjust the slider plate in every way possible, including the correct way by applying pressure with a screwdriver. Doing so results in a less positive "latch" doing it the correct way, I could unlatch it with my pinky finger basically. When sliding it back a tad, I got a lot of rudder slop and a strange, double unlock feel. It would release relatively easily then bind again when the rudder was kicked back a good 20 degree. I could visually see the cam was unlocked at this point, but couldn't see how or why it felt it was binding for the 2nd time, which required slightly more force to get it up. If I were to crank in the tension screw up to a certain point, the entire system would get stuck and I'd either have to slide the aluminum adjuster all the way out so that I can back out the screw, or force it open, which resulted in shearing off the plunger top.