Wanderfin issue-gctid380980

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I put a Wanderfin on my 2452 last year, only used it 1 time before the season ended. I noticed later that the port side fin was bent inwards, close to 1" off of the line at the bottom. There was no indication of hitting anything, so it looked like it came from the factory like that. I contacted them and we discussed how else this could have happened. With no marks on it, we felt it must have slipped past their QA department so they shipped me a new one. I checked it to make sure it was square and put it on this spring and went out for my first trip (this is the one where my drive piled up coming it to dock). When we were rebuilding the drive I looked at the Wanderfin, and it was bent exactly like the one I had replaced. The only thing I can think is that the force of the water coming off the prop acts on the side of the fin and bends it.

Has anyone else seen this?

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Haven't seen it as I don't own one but if you look at the size of the aluminum "wanderfin rudder" and that it's only welded to the top plate you can imagine the forces your prop wash will have with that lever on the junction point...... In my opinion it should go all the way down and be attached to the skeg below the prop (especially at $180...).

I wish there would be something solid to improve the low speed steering of my alpha drive.

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That has not happened to mine. The fins still sit the way they did after the install.

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Well I only have one hour on mine so far But I will check 'er out first chance I get.

That seems like that could not happen just from the force of water tho? That seems pretty severe to me.

Thanks for alerting us to this

Sarah

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Are these the same thing? I have a SuperFin on my Alpha One and both verticle plates are bent in. Does not seem to effect slow speed handling

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Yes, they are the same.

[BLCarl Frequent Contributor Find all posts View Profile Close BLCarl]

I've had my Superfin II for 2 seasons now and haven't noticed any bending, But I did mount mine to the underside of the cavplate.

Mounted to the curved top side of the plate if not spaced out would tend to pull the center up and the outside edges down if the center cutout comes In contact with the drive . Also the flat bottom of the cavplate might help stiffen the suprefin II.

If it were actually designed to be mounted to the underside there might not be any need to have the "V" cutout in the center further stiffening the top plate of the finns.

I did discuss the bottom mounting idea with Doug but he didn't seam think It was preferable at the time, I don't remember the reason. He didn't share a reason not to bottom mount the fin so I did. So far so good. I've only bashed it once against a friends swimstep/bait tank. No damage to the fin but the tank needed some new fittings and the scar on his fiberglass swimstep is hardly noticeable if you don't look too close.

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frenchcreek wrote:
I put a Wanderfin on my 2452 last year, only used it 1 time before the season ended. I noticed later that the port side fin was bent inwards, close to 1" off of the line at the bottom. There was no indication of hitting anything, so it looked like it came from the factory like that. I contacted them and we discussed how else this could have happened. With no marks on it, we felt it must have slipped past their QA department so they shipped me a new one. I checked it to make sure it was square and put it on this spring and went out for my first trip (this is the one where my drive piled up coming it to dock). When we were rebuilding the drive I looked at the Wanderfin, and it was bent exactly like the one I had replaced. The only thing I can think is that the force of the water coming off the prop acts on the side of the fin and bends it.

Has anyone else seen this?

Two questions:

1- Does this seem to be happening with only the dual fin?

2- It almost sounds to me that there is not sufficient washers between the fin plate and the drive and the fin plate is bending to match the curve of the drive plate.

Dutch

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It is mounted properly with the spacers. The top plate is fine, but the port fin is bent.

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did some mechanical simulation and I think I figured out what's wrong, why it's only the port fin and what would be a potential fix...... Good to have such stuff at work......

The fix is dead simple: two holes in each fin at the bottom and two threaded rods with self locking nuts in between. They have to be offset in hight to make it really effective. There will be still stress on the fins as expected but the dual offset connection at the bottom will distribute the forces completely different thus not be able to bend the fin as easy but it may not look as 6y.

What causes it is the rotational direction of the prop which makes the bending forces a lot higher on the port side. Naturally you will only see that with strong engines. Mounting it to the bottom of the cavitation plate also gave less stress in the material at the critical points.

Funny thing is, there's a company in the Netherlands (http://www.course-keeper.com) which makes a higher sophisticated version of it which doesn't need drilling into the cavitation plate and flips up when you reach higher speeds and guess what: they hold the thing together in the way I suggested...... Not sure that they simulated the stuff as it looks to me that their construction simply required it. It's only a tad more expensive than the dual wanderfin but I couldn't find a distributor in the US with a quick search.

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Hi

I bought and installed my wander fin last year (actually I think it was the superfin at the time) and have enjoyed it. However, a short time ago I was checking my lower unit and I found that a large piece of the caviation plate that the fin was attached to had cracked, and in fact was only held on by the superfin itself. A few days later I removed the fin and found that the plate had started to crack on the other side right on one of the installation holes. Now my cavitation plate is destroyed and I am not sure I can get it welded, if I can't I am looking at a whole new lower unit.

I cannot say for sure that the fin and the force that it generates caused this, but I can tell you that I did not hit anything, and that the fin was installed exactly according to directions. On the right side, most of the cavitation plate from the center outboard cracked completely off (but not on the holes) and as noted on the left side, it cracked right on one of the holes, with a much smaller piece breaking off. I will try and post my photos if anyone wants to see them.

I dont think I will be reinstalling mine, which is a shame becuase it really worked well, a fact I noticed when I was driving the boat without the superfin.

beware!!

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You will be able to repair the plate, I am sorry to hear about the problems though . I wonder if reinforcing the plate would help...

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Interesting reading here.

Initially this thread scared me some because my cav plate had a hunk out of it prior to the Wanderfin. (starboard side, about halfway front to back and not in the area the WF is installed) I mounted mine on top of the cav plate and used some teflon washers to fill in the space between the plate and the WF - I was concerned that tightening the bolts would snap the cav plate just like a potato chip.

Pleased to report that after about 130 hrs the WF has no bent fins and the cav plate remains intact as well. Bolts are still tight and the Fin has not moved at all. True that I don't run hard (maybe 6-8 hrs on plane all summer so far)

I was also able to change my prop w/out removing the WF - a nice surprise!

All in all I like it, altho I feel that it makes reverse more difficult (seems to make my bow move around more than without it)

This is a gut feeling, a casual observation,,,,,,,not backed by any scientific measurements

Going forward at Lazycrusr speeds it is WONDERFUL

Recommended

Sarah

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I just read this thread and my wander fin arrives this Tuesday. My old 2452 was terrible at slow speed and so is the 289. Should I look at mounting this to the bottom of the caviation plate. That sure seems like there would be a lot less stress on the plate that way. I had a se sport fin on my 2452 with no problems and could plane way slower. What about adding a alum plate to the bottom side of the caviation plate with the fin on the top side to place the stress over a bigger area? Thoughts please.

Rock

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Good luck Rock... I would prefer the bigger trim tabs myself with the drop fins. But some like these as well... Let us know how it works out for you. I am sure a few are interested...