Rudder question

Well as I've done with everything on my boat since I bought it, I've been meticulously going through every part of the boat to check the status of all it's parts and systems. I've got a long way to go yet, but since I had been looking at the prop, I decided to research the rudder and remembered something I had come across when perusing through the Nautique Parts site: a replacement rudder with trim tab. Mine does not have a trim tab and that had me curious. Was the rudder replaced at some point or did they all come without and the tab version is an upgrade that has come out since.

This is the one I saw:

Joseph,
Google "rudder tuning" and you will find that putting a slight bevel on one side of ether the forward or aft side of the rudder will do the same.

Rudder tuning is not for correcting a helm wheel that isn't centered when going straight. Tuning creates a loading on the wheel to eliminate a straight line neutral wobble (slack in the system) when say running down a shalom course. To correct the wheel off center, the clamp tube that holds the steering cable at the aft end just before it attaches to the rudder tiller arm is moved fore or aft.

You can google rudder tuning and go here

Hollywood wrote: 8122pbrainard wrote: To correct the wheel off center, the clamp tube that holds the steering cable at the aft end just before it attaches to the rudder tiller arm is moved fore or aft. No. That evens out the left and right deflection, regardless of where the steering wheel points.

Correct and when you change the rudder defection, the helm wheel will change position necessitating a different position of the wheel to maintain the same boat direction. One thing I should have mentioned, the lock to lock helm should be checked making sure you get approximately the same rudder movement in each direction.

Well I finally got around to checking out the rudder to see just what one of the last owners had done......

PORT side:


STARBOARD side:


TOP view:


And there's the answer..... So my question now is do I bevel the port side to match even though by the looks of it the trailing edge is going to end up like a knife edge?

Ok, well others had said that these were set from the factory to have zero, or neutral steering so I was assuming this had been done after the fact, considering the fairly strong pull while at speed.

I understand not wanting any neutral "wobble" - my first boat was a smaller inboard/outboard that had quite a bit of this off plane and I really don't want to go back there!   However, this one seems to be a bit the opposite and, as with everything on an owners boat, this is one of those personal preference points: some may not mind, or even prefer a strong pull. Others, like me, would prefer not to notice it nearly as much as this boat seems to have.   Thus, I will be tuning it to alleviate a good portion.   I was just curious if others had rudders ground to this extreme (how it appears to me) and if correcting it ended up with a knife edge at the trailing edge.