Two-Rudder Steering?

I had an Idea last night: How about a surfski with a rudder under the bow as well as the stern. They would turn in opposite directions when you pushed the pedal. Here's the advantages I can see:
- sharper turn initiation
- you could turn with less rudder angle and thus less tendency to stall the rudder
- when the back rudders out of the water the front one is still in
- the tendency of a rudder to roll the boat is neutralized

I think the biggest downside would be more drag in the water - but perhaps you could get away with smaller rudders to offset this.

What you guys think? Good Idea? Stupid? Already been done and failed miserably?

Not stupid, but done here in oz with mainly doubles spec ski, never had much to do with the doubles but I do know it helps get them around the cans and better stability on the waves coming in.

Sure someone out there has more info.

keep thinking........

It has been tried - I paddled a spec ski a couple of years ago that some guys had modified to have a rudder in the nose.

It looked truly bizarre but it certainly turned sharply!

It was even handle-able on waves.

One big downside was the complexity and cost (in terms of weight) of the hardware to mount the rudder in the nose. Also you have to be careful not to hit the sand when coming into the beach.

I don't see it becoming mainstream.

I own a double Burton spec ski (oz) which has two rudders, turns better than my single spec ski, only designed for round the cans. In a river race we paddled, it just meant having to pull weed off both rudders, ie get off and swim. Steering on breaking waves (surf) it makes little difference as it is quite small, although on unbroken swell you have to remember that once that a ski of that length begins to turn, it takes a lot of effort to bring it back, no matter how many rudders you have, and it will act like a brake if you use it too much.

The engineering is surprisingly simple, just an extra set of cables from the pedals that are crossed before the front rudder shaft.

I wouldn't modify your ocean ski.

There was an old model of Burton single spec ski that had 2 rudders at the rear , one was smaller and halfway along the rear deck (cabled the regular way) so it would always be in the water on a run even if the bigger standard one was in air. Many spec doubles had 2 rudders with a smaller one at the bow and cabled the reverse of the larger rear (but operated with the same pedals) This is not so common these days but I have seen 2 rudders (bow) on a few older singles from Anderson and Gibbons, and heard it was a lot more draggy(as well as heavier/cable complexity etc) and no current models have them to my knowledge. Lats

Oh ,and we also (Australia) drilled a hole and mounted a front rudder(reverse cables) in a wooden Struer commander K4 for the last K4 10,000m race held at the worlds in Paris in 1991 (it was then banned from use) That race had 90 degree turns every 500m after the first and second 1000m.

Wow - I assumed that it worked well and that's why it was banned?

zachhandler wrote:

Wow - I assumed that it worked well and that's why it was banned?

No it was banned as they said it was unsportmanlike (unfair) without any form of official testing , the ICF rules now state only 1 rudder may be used and that is not allowed to be over the stern and increase the length of the craft (It was allowed to be over the stern previously but only 1cm max width)