INVESTIGATOR 563

When I bought the boat it had a very crude swing up rudder blade. The cheeks were a couple of pieces of aluminium with a couple of pieces of suspect ply packing them apart. A folded s/s channel on the top of the cheeks formed a pocket for a sloppy but fixed tiller. The blade was beautiful so I kept it - shaped, glass sheathed timber and quite deep.
Now, the boat stays on a mooring so a slight rethink would be required if you are trailing - because the cheeks are s/s the unit is not light weight and I'm sure with a modified top to the blade it could swing up nearly vertical.
The feature on the boat which makes the unit fairly permanent is the head/tiller having to go thru the cut out under the main traveller. From the pics you will see the round head allen-keyed bolts which hold the the head to the cheeks - this has to be removed to lift the cheeks from the pintles. The tiller pivots up in the head to allow standing to steer or to keep the cockpit clear at anchor. The curved tiller is laminated white beech and Australian red cedar as all tillers have been on our family boats for 45 yrs - am running out of beech though.
The downhaul, which is wire with a rope tail goes from the rudder head mounted clam cleat, over an exit block, down thru the cheeks (which are fabricated plate) around the curved edge of the top of the blade then into hole in the blade where a swage on the end of the wire is retained by a dished key-hole clip.
The uphaul also goes thru an exit block but comes out thru the back plate of the cheeks and on to a small hound fitting on th back of the blade

...and also

That is a beautiful thing.
How does it feel underway?
Peter

It can go down slightly passed vertical in which case the its so light that the blade takes control - not nice. In the correct trim it is purrr.....fect.

Clear and very useful photos and description. A solid unit and very practical.
I'm heading for my workshop as I speak.
Thanks

Having had a swing up rudder on my Careel, and with a drop down type on the Investigator 563, I find I prefer the drop type. Main reason is that in shallow water I can lift the blade, but still leave enough down to steer. With the swing blade, there was the danger of hitting the outboard prop. Steering with outboard alone is a bit too coarse a control.

Its a bit of both. With a drop down blade you really need to have the blade in a swing up box in the cheeks which some C22's have and it seems to work fine. Its just a lot more work to make. Each to his own. I always steer by rudder except in close quarters where I need the controls - haven't got remotes yet.
To stop hitting the prop I use the 40 year old Careel 18 method of a shaped bread board on top of the cavitation plate which also minimises cavitation in reverse.
My hold down line is low load so tends to let the blade rise even when I hit floating weed - am going to change it to a CL257 quick release clam cleat. As soon as the blade releases the tiller load increases so you can tell that you are in shallow water.

Sometime back I said I'd post details of my rudderblade.See the pics
The blade is 900mm long from the waterline, 300mm deep fore and aft and a 42mm thick foil