rgano
Guru
- Joined
- Oct 8, 2007
- Messages
- 5,196
- Location
- Panama City area
- Vessel Name
- FROLIC
- Vessel Make
- Mainship 30 Pilot II since 2015. GB-42 1986-2015. Former Unlimited Tonnage Master
I was going through my automated maintenance list which happened to include lubrication of the hydraulic pistons of the rudder ram when I noted the slightly corroded bronze packing nut and jam nut of the rudder post seal. I decided that since I had never checked the packing that I would pull the packing nut up as far as it would go and use my pick tools to pull whatever packing was there with an eye toward replacement. With the boat living in a lift, not having any packing material on hand was no big deal. Turns out there was no evidence of any packing ever having been in there. The oddest thing is that I have never in the five years of ownership noted any leakage through the packing when the boat was in the water. I went ahead and inserted a couple of rings of teflon impregnated packing and lowered the boat into the water just to be sure all was well before running the jam nut back into place. Hmmmm