jmad… you need technique, not rudder.
Whitewater boats have a “sweet spot” or a good zone within which they will cheerfully track straight stroke after stroke after stroke. But they are also built for skidding turns, and if they get a bit out of the good zone, they will try to skid and spin. Skegs or rudders just ruin these boats for whitewater. If you keep at it, soon you will hardly ever skid and will hardly ever have to take a correction stroke. I’ve gotten so good at this after a dozen years that I have trouble remembering what it was like to have the problems you are experiencing.
“this not the eternal debate” - ha!
You freaking kayak guys are a bunch of fickle pansies!
Get a canoe, and you don’t need a rudder or a skeg.
Cheers,
JackL
hey
what if you Tour fast?
Hey
Jack your QCC have the Skeg or Rudder? L
It has whatever…
…you call that big thing sticking up on the back that prevents you from tipping it upside down, and gets caught in the bushes on a 18 foot wide turn around.
Cheers,
JackL
first steal a highway sign
– Last Updated: Aug-26-04 1:27 PM EST –
hahaha just kidding. i found mine in the beaufort river, where it had fallen off a bridge. i called the highway people to come get it but they didnt. anyway its 1/10" tempered aluminum, great stuff for skegs. i cut two 'straps' (out of cardboard first) about 2" x 8" and bent them to form a Y (plan view)shaped bracket to fit the back of the yak, one strap on each side of the stern, with about 3/16" between them where they stick out about 4" behind thestern. the skeg looks like a rounded, elongated D about 12" long with 1/4" hole for the control line in one corner and a pivot hole about 3" from the same end. hey i'll try to send a digital photo of a couple of mine.
Rudder = Cruise Control
I do understand how a skeg works and the obvious how a rudder works but on a long road trip I like cruise control and in this case a rudder for touring purposes and especially using a longer less maneuverable boat.
I compare using a rudder to using cruise control in my vehicle, it just makes the voyage so much less stressful and more enjoyable, although thinking about it, rudder control is more like double gas pedals but fortunetly only need to make random corrections.
Brian
yeh
some would say I do!
I much prefer skeg. It’s up 90% of the time anyway (what would a rudder be doing for me then?). Skeg is less to think about. You can just paddle. Much more comfortable using feet/legs for overall power/boat control than when also needing finer control and holding less than ideal positions with your feet as you work the rudder.
Rudder’s worth the extra complexity and discomfort for racing (if you race seriously and are in the top 10% in your races) - otherwise you’d have a hard time selling me on a rudder for a touring type boat that had both options available (which isn’t that many - so the discussion is funny really).
I am even more skeg biased since I ditched the footpegs - which gave a whole new level of comfort and control. - foamed bulkhead is night and day over pegs - but people who’ve always had pegs have no way to compare. That you have to feel to believe. I’ve come to believe that 80% of the issue people have with seating position, numbness, sore legs/backs, etc. - are footpeg related.
PS - for real speed, paddlers need training time - not rudders. One you have the speed - then you can take advantage of the rudder’s small contribution.
Here is my experience…
A rudder can do everything a skeg can do, but a skeg can’t do everything a rudder can do. I’m talking about maneuvering in a tight marsh and the like. The only instance where a skeg is better is in high swells where the rudder will momentarily come out of the water, whereas the skeg doesn’t. As for footpegs - that’s all I have anyway as my boat doesn’t have a forward bulkhead, let alone a foam one. I wouldn’t even want one because I would loose the ability to store an extra paddle up front. If my legs or feet get tired, I can just stretch them out for awhile. Yes, my rudder just sits there most of the time too. It’s like my PFD - I don’t really need it 99% of the time, but when I do need it, it works great and is a big help. I don’t view it as some badge of dishonor for poor stroke technique. Skegs are fine things too and have their advantages - just not enough to worry about going with one or the other. Some say that the rudders sail area is a disadvantage, maybe so - but if the wind is high enough to affect your boat because of your rudder, it’s probably time to go ahead and stick it in the water!
maneuvering in a tight marsh
or other twisty heavily vegetated area are you really using the rudder to effect?
In that situation are you really going fast enough for the rudder to bite enough for aggressive turns - or are you really using the paddle and thinking the rudder helps? At lower speeds doing tight maneuvering - the rudder is probably a psychological aid more than a physical one.
In places like that - I see a rudder as a liability. More likely to snag things - whether it’s up or down. JackL’s comment above illustrates this nicely.
Well…
Never had mine snag anything, but it doesn’t stick straight up like the one on QCC boats. As for speed, it would have to be very constricted indeed for me to be going less than my usual 3.5 mph cruising speed, but I believe bare steerageway is much lower than that. I have been in a situation where it was too narrow for a good sweep stroke and used the rudder to help swing the stern around. I’m sure I could have done it without the rudder, but I had it so I used it.
By the way, the one skeg boat I have ever tried at a demo day never worked as it was jammed in the up position from sand & etc getting up there. I know there are remedies for this, but I’m sure this first impression really did not help my current opinion. Regardless, I don’t discount people who use skegs either - they like them and they use them. Fine. I still maintain that having a rudder is no more an indication of poor stroke/edging techniques than wearing a PFD is an indicator of poor swimming abilities.
Touring fast
Overlooks the sights along the way and beside Im the slowest paddler in the universe so touring fast is out of the question for me. Fast boat or knot.
Brian
well said about pfd and rudder : )
Sights
I don’t overlook the sights at all, just get to see more of them in the same time!
Cruise control
>A rudder can do everything a skeg can do, but a skeg can’t do everything a rudder can do. I’m talking about maneuvering in a tight marsh and the like.<
I think in a tight marsh, effective maneuvering can still be had by a combination of lean turns and sweep strokes. I’m saying this with an assumption also that no one is trying to race throught the marsh. So efficiency or speed isn’t an issue.
What else does a rudder do that a skeg does not, (for touring)?
The funny thing is, I consider a skeg a “cruise control” in the wind. I set the skeg at a depth to counter the weathercocking and forgets it until I need to go a totally different direction. I can paddle normally while the skeg does “its” magic. That’s what came to my mind when I saw the “cruise control” notion.
I don’t have a problem with the IDEA of rudder. Nor do I have any problem with the part that’s outside the boat. But I do have a problem with part of its implementation: the mushy footpeg! I wouldn’t have minded a rudder that can be set at any angle, to compensate the wind, without my having to maintain that angle with my legs all the time. That’s a bit too much work for me, especially that work isn’t really “neccessary” if you have a skeg.
We all came from different background that colored our preferrence. Functionally, both skeg and rudder pretty much accomplish the same thing pretty well. For some, the ease of instant control from a push of the leg is the advantage of rudder. For me, I prefer the set-and-forget “cruise control” of a skeg.
Well said!
That actually applies even more so to us slower paddlers.
I took Brent’s Forward stroke class a couple weeks ago. In the begining of the class, Brent asked each of us what we want to get out of the class. One of the student (a beginer) said exactly that, “to see more in the same amount of time”!
But if I ever reach a comfortable 5 knot cruising speed, I’ll start thinking about slowing down. ;o)
interesting demo
– Last Updated: Aug-26-04 8:33 PM EST –
when i first looked at kayaks, i tried both rudders and skegs, and, probably due to inexperience, did find a place for both - - well, maybe it's a case of trying to teach an' ol' dog new tricks, but - -
last evening, i took the demo 13 1/2' boat i was considering out for a 3hr paddle with my wed evening group - we paddled in cape cod bay, parallel to the shore - had a starboard quartering 2 foot chop on the outbound leg, and some starboard side beam wind, plus some eratic power boat wake - - i had serious control problems, as i was trying to use both rudder, and leaning to control the boat, and as you can visualize, it just doesn't work - i had the rudder in a slight right turn aspect to hold course, but when wake pushed me left, my ingrained sense told me to lean left with some pressure on the left peg to bring her back on course,and of course, everything went to pieces - - i finally housed the rudder, and went back to my old ways, and had no problems - - took my own skeg boat out today, and realized my problem is probably more a case of needing about 1/2" more padding under the combing rim to tighten up my fit in the cockpit, than in changing to a rudder -
i think that at some point i'll probably transition over, but not quite yet - - i do see a place for both, but wonder if a person can be using both systems without having to be thinking about what they're doing, and as tom cruise said in "top gun", when you have to take time to think, you're dead (well, maybe not quite, but - - )
i found i learned a lot of good info from this thread, and intend to print it for my "useful info" file
thanks - john
I guess it’s where you paddle as well…
I thought this was obvious, but can a skeg actually maneuver a kayak like a rudder can? I don’t think so. I have paddled numerous times in feeder canals where there are constant obstacles in the form of fallen trees, overhanging branches, rocks, etc. Since I have a fiberglass boat, I don’t like dragging the bottom or brushing the top on anything and I simply cannot turn as fast or as tight with my paddle strokes + lean/edging as I can with my strokes + rudder. I don’t think a skeg is going to help much in this situation. I think the rudder has better all-around capability, but if you are a strictly open water paddler - you certainly don’t need one. I personally don’t have a problem steering with my foot pegs, but I have a roomy boat and others may have less room/worse system. I guess for some the fact that you actually maneuver your craft with anything but stroke technique and lean/edging is ‘poor form’. My arguement is that in certain situations, the rudder can help turn the boat better. I guess I find it hard to believe I have to argue this point - my next one will be to affirm that water is wet!
weird that pushing right to turn right
is how rudders work. and non rudder paddling, skeg or no, means pushing left foot to turn right. why? why? why? yall cross those wires and make your technique the same from boat to boat. after paddling with no appendage and then paddling with a skeg, i was taken aback the first time i tried a ruddered boat. all backa?? from ‘normal’ technique. non ruddered boats, press the left foot to go right. ruddered boats, what? and why? please explain
Is water wet?
>My arguement is that in certain situations, the rudder can help turn the boat better. I guess I find it hard to believe I have to argue this point - my next one will be to affirm that water is wet!<
I’m afraid that might become neccessary! ;o)
I simply cannot turn as fast or as tight with my paddle strokes + lean/edging as I can with my strokes + rudder. I don’t think a skeg is going to help much in this situation. <
That’s where our experience differ. I can turn the boat fastest with paddle strokes. A stern or bow rudder, and the more extreem reverse sweep can turn the boat a great deal faster than throwing the rudder all the way to one side, leaned or no lean. While edging accomplishes more or less what most people use rudder for: small and fine course corrections without thinking.
No, the skeg doesn’t help meneuvering at all. It’s best to get it out of the way for zigzaging in the marshes…