Rudder testing and installation course development

In the midst of everything else that’s been going on we’ve been steadily slogging away at developing our skin on frame rudder and footbraces instructions.

Basically I have three goals for this new addition to our video courses: The first one is to lose more money than I could ever possibly make back on the time invested into this project (Mission accomplished!) The second is to create a rudder control system to accompany the sailing system that we will hopefully have ready for release by the end of the summer. And the third is to create rock solid skin on frame rudder installation instructions, so people can do this in six hours instead of spending four nights on the Internet, ordering stuff, realizing it’s the wrong stuff and then ordering more stuff, and then making three trips to the hardware store and then fighting your way through the install over the course of a long weekend or two. You’re welcome.

We’re getting there but oh my God the variables…. Two different rudders, three different Rudder blades, three different types of mounting brackets, three different types of rudder control foot braces, two different footbrace install methods, tons of different bits and bobbles, and four different kayaks. And then installing and uninstalling all that hardware over and over and over in a bunch of combinations and testing them on all the different boats. And we are just getting started with the sail testing now.

I’m not sure if it was actually a great idea to go down this particular rabbit hole but I can tell you that there are definitely better and worse ways to do things and by the time we are done there’s going to be a mini video course and a plan set that says: do exactly this in this situation if you want to get this type of performance with these compromises and these advantages.

Personally I hate rudders, but there are a few situations in which they make a lot of sense, so it was time to rip the Band-Aid off and get this work done.