New tiller

3rd August 2022

Bay Leaf had a fairly tatty tiller, dark wood, with an elbow bend made of metal to which the tiller extension was attached. On our recent sail we noticed that this elbow joint was failing resulting in a wobbly tiller which felt like it might break. The previous owner had left a brand new tiller in the boat, apparently custom made, beautifully laminated, but raw (unvarnished) and it would need to be cut and fitted into the stainless steel / chrome piece that bolts on top of the rudder post. I have been putting this off for about two years now.


My friend Charles Taylor at the club is very good with wood and he agreed to sort this out for me - cut and fit the new tiller into the metal fitting, make sure the angle was correct, buff up the metal piece, and apply some oil and varnish. We met at the boat on Wednesday evening and it looked great, much admired by other sailors as we carried it to the boat. Charles also found, loose inside Bay Leaf near the rudder post, a couple of steel spacers and when we threaded them onto the bolt and onto the post, it sat really well and felt perfect. 



Looking forward to trying it out!


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