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PostPosted: Thu Mar 08, 2012 8:01 am 
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Joined: Thu Mar 08, 2012 6:14 am
Posts: 5
I bought an adventure island last autumn and I am very satisfied with it (so far.....)!

I received the new (bigger-,sailing-)rudder with it and want to replace that now to get my Hobie ready for spring. One thing is disturbing me, and thats the tiller direction. If you move it to the left, your kayak is steering to the left. And, offcourse, it does the same to the right. (sounds, however, very logical :D ) But the steering works just opposite of what we are used to with a sailingboat. If you move the tiller away from you, the boat steers towards you. And the other way around.

It is obvious that we can be used to that difference, but if I am replacing the rudder anyway I wondered if it gives a problem when I convert the internallines so that they work opposite to the standard steering.

I hope my question is clear and that someone can answer me on that. Thanks in advance :wink:

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PostPosted: Thu Mar 08, 2012 9:32 am 
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Joined: Mon Feb 11, 2008 4:34 pm
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Location: Hobie Cat: Oceanside, CA
No problem at all to swap the line to your preference. Just undo them from the steering crank and be sure there are no twists.

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PostPosted: Thu Mar 08, 2012 12:22 pm 
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Joined: Thu Sep 30, 2010 4:44 am
Posts: 38
Location: Weymouth, Dorset.UK
I have been sailing for many years mostly using a tiller and it is deeply ingrained which way to push and pull. When the larger rudders came along I had the lines reversed and it does not work as you may think, I put it back to the original way asap.

I think, its because you're facing forwards rather than sideways as in most craft, the point and go does work for the AI.


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PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 12:00 am 
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Joined: Thu Mar 08, 2012 6:14 am
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Thank you for your quick answers!!

So we have a yes and a no......

Are there more people out there who did try to reverse the lines?

Just logical seen, I think it should work without any problems. there's no different in 'moment' by reversing them. The lines keep the same length......

But somehow it I have the feeling that I am missing something why it shouldn't work that easy.

Otherwise it will be just try and error...


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PostPosted: Sat Mar 10, 2012 7:28 pm 
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Joined: Mon Feb 28, 2011 5:58 pm
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Location: Adelaide, South Australia
Here is a quote from my post on the string "Island rudder replacement program" that you may find helpful if you are replacing the rudder.
With regard to switching to "traditional" tiller setup. it is straightforward and works well. Just route the line to the other side when replacing.
Takes a bit of getting used to but on balance feels more natural if you are used to tiller steering.

"To Stringy, Mickeymouse, Slaughter and anyone else wanting to replace the rudder using the existing lines - I have just done so on my 2011 Island and in the process discovered a surprising solution to the short up/down line problem. When I looked inside the hull, I found about 20cm of spare Spectra hanging down from its junction with the black heavier cord that runs to the handles. The join is made using the same slipknot-over-knot technique as shown in the instruction video on page 1 of this thread. It was fiddly as hell to loosen the the slip knots inside the hull - I could only just get two skinny arms inside the rear hatch and then had to do it by feel - but once done it was a snack to re-tie a loop further down and slip it over the knot on the black cord. This liberated more than enough cord to connect the up and down lines, and also allowed me to discard the last few centimetres that had frayed under the clamping screw. So now I have perfectly good line all the way, and I still have about 10 cm left inside the boat so I can let some more out using the same technique if the rudder ends get frayed again. I don't know whether all TIs have this little built-in bonus, but it was very welcome in my case.

If your boat doesn't, you could still do what I had intended, which prompted me to look inside the hull in the first place. It should be possible to splice in a short length of cord (could use the new cord supplied with the rudder kit) at the junction point inside the hull, using the slipknot/knot technique, and free up enough to connect to the rudder without the messy business of splicing in cord at the rudder end, which looked to me like it would require knots that might foul the up/down mechanism.

One other tip. I found that clamping the up/down lines with vicegrips at the exit point from the hull kept tension on the lines inside and held them up under the top of the hull where I couldn't see or handle them easily. It would have been virtually impossible to loosen the slipknot this way. The solution (sort-of) is to undo the drain plug at the stern and run a cord in through the hole. Tie this to the end of the black cord inside the hull (a half hitch around the cord where it joins the bungy worked OK), take up the bungie tension, and tie off (I used the bungy anchors in the rear gear well). You can then relase the vicegrip on the line you have tied to. You still need to clamp the other line as it is still under bungy tension, and will disappear if you let it go, but you now have slack in the line you are working on, and it is lower in the boat and easier to see and grasp. When one side is finished, swap to the other line and repeat.


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PostPosted: Sun Mar 11, 2012 4:22 pm 
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Joined: Mon Feb 28, 2011 5:58 pm
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Location: Adelaide, South Australia
Anoher quote that may help. This was for changing over just the steering lines, which I did after replacing the rudder, but the principles apply to the full changeover, particularly if you are trying to use the existing lines.

"Changing the steering lines was dead easy. Much of the technique is demonstrated in the rudder replacement video put out by Hobie.
Reach in through the rear hatch and free the two guide tubes for the steering lines from the upside-down padeye under the portside rim of the hatch. There are three lines there - the steering lines and the up line for the rudder. You can free them all and distinguish them by wiggling the rudder and watching which tubes move. Then undo the lines at the rudder, push the guide tubes out a bit from inside the hull - you might need to use a flat blade screwdriver to winkle the black tube-end out - slide the two black collars over the lines (one goes inside the guide tube, the other outside to locate it) and then you can pull the guide tubes back into the hull. It is probably a good idea to tie one knot in the port and two in the starboard line before you do this so you know which was which.
Then swap them around, slide the line and guides out through the holes in the hull, thread the outer and then inner collars over the tubes and lines, and re-install. Put the guide tubes back under the padeye, making sure there is a straight run forward to the steering levers over the top of the foam flotation block on which they can catch. Finally, re-tension and secure the lines, checking that the levers are centred when the rudder is straight ahead.
Sorry but can't do photos because I am too lazy to disassemble. Hope this is clear enough."


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PostPosted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 5:23 am 
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Joined: Fri Jan 27, 2012 10:57 pm
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Location: Ormiston, Australia
I had the steering assembly fall off and accidentally replaced the steering lines the wrong way round. I found this out on the next outing. I was to lazy to go home and fix it so I thought "it can't be that hard, just do the opposite to what you normally do." Well it was an intersting sail so say the least, old habits are hard to break especially when the wind picks up and things happen quicker. I have swapped it back now. You could probably re-learn if you really wanted to.

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PostPosted: Thu Apr 26, 2012 10:39 pm 
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Joined: Thu Mar 08, 2012 6:14 am
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I replaced the rudder and reversed the steeringlines. Very easy and works very good.

With sailing it is completely natural according to a normal sailingboat but pedaling with miragedrive I have to get used to it. But I used it most sailing anyway.

Next projects:
- tillerextention (realy don't understand why there hasn't been produced a Hobie one which you just screw in the steeringhandle in stead of the steeringknob?)
- Haka bench

Greetz,

Remko


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