The retractable weighted keel works just like a traditional sail boat. I don’t know if the pics are still there with me sitting and standing on the gunwail of my TI in our pool. But the thing actually worked really well. I just got a steel carpenters square from home depot, (it happens to be made from spring steel). Bought a bunch of scuba weight belt weights, ( the little beads in a bag). Made myself a little mold, (pointed on the ends) from two sheets of plastic taped together on the ends. I mixed the lead beads with some polyester resin from home depot, took maybe a quart I think, but I don’t remember for sure. With the carpenders square in the middle standing straight up I poured the lead bead, polyester mix into the mold. Took about two hours to make the thing. I then took an old mirage drive plug, re-enforced a little by filling it with 2 part urethane foam. With a cutout for the carpenters square in the center, (I wrapped the carpenters square with plastic to prevent it from sticking to the foam). I drilled 3 or 4 hole thru the side of the carpenters square so I could set heights, then just shove a pin thru the hole when I want to adjust the height. The mirage drive plug is easily removed with the built in latches. Later on I designed a hinge so it would be a swinging keel, but that was kind of a waste of time and effort, and didn’t do much.
Lead costs around $4 bucks a lb you know, and we needed 50 lbs for the TI’s, and 20 lbs for our revo’s, and around 30 lbs for either an AI or Oasis. With the carpenters sq fully down, the boats were totally un-capsizable. We were avid scuba divers, so we already had most of the lead weights laying around our shop. Hope this helps FE
Note: on the revo’s we needed the mirage drive for kayak sailing, (our favorite thing to do). So instead we just poured the lead weights into PVC tubing, ( just the beads, no polyester resin), then capped the ends. We then suspended the keel under the boat with grey spectra string, (hobie rudder line). Look up the weight of lead, then select the PVC diameter and length based on the volume, (easy math), because I don’t remember the dimensions for sure, (I think it was around 2in dia pvc 2 ft long for our two revo’s). The weight was low enough to clear underneath the mirage fins.
For safety reasons, don’t eat the beads, (just kidding)
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