Centreboard and Rudderblade Heel Protection

[Craic]

Our SeaRaider has a plywood centreboard, the heel (leading edge low tip) often got damaged through hitting stones and gravel. The same happened to the rudderblade heel. The damaged areas were always very small, just the lowest 1- 2 inches were ever affected.
First I just sanded and re-painted, but that repair only lasted until the next bang.
I finally epoxied on a few layers of glass over the heel, and that repair so far survived a few groundings without major damage. But the contour of the heel makes it diffcult to apply the glass without wrinkles, so it's not a very neat job.

Our BayRaider has a GRP board and rudderblade. Because I anticipated that there would be similar problems to the heels from hard groundings, I put on brass protectors. The little notch in the board heel had to go in the the process, but I think that it would not have lasted long anyway.

[Craic]

That above heel protector on the centreboard wasn't enough, I had an impact from a stone 2" further up the board. It did not sound too bad when it happened, but the damage was significant, chipping, dent and exposed fibreglass. To repair I jigsawed off the damaged part of the leading edge and extended the brass profile protector 12" further up the board. Once you have the proper material to hand and know what to do, it's not a major job. What helps is that on the BayRaider you can lift the centreboard out of its case after unscrewing it from the pivot in the keel, without having to remove the case top.