Hynautic steering

[javalin390]

Hi Folks. Well after laying her up for the winter, it was time to fix some issues. In an attempt to save a few bucks, I decided to winterize the engines myself. I figured it would be simple, just unscrew all of the pipe plugs on the block & exhaust manifolds. Unfortunately, every single plug broke off or stripped out. I ended up pulling all 4 manifold assemblies, and then saw how bad they were. The plugs in the bottom of the blocks were no big deal, cleaned up the threads in the block and the plugs themselves, done. Pulled the thermostats & filled the engines with the purple envro-friendly anti-freeze. The manifolds however was a different story. Two were original, two were newer OSCO's, but still rusty. Ever price out a set ?!!!! The casting walls are in good shape, bet the ends at the gasket surfaces were smoked. I simply re-machined all the machined faces to true up the gasket mating surfaces. Then re-tapped all the pipe plug holes and replaced them with stainless steel pipe plugs. Well, one thing leads to another, and so I re-built the raw water pumps while I was at it. All said & done, it was probably a good thing, so that all those rusty, rotted pieces would have been a problem down the road (or river) are now fixed. Now onto the second needed repair.
My Port rudder has leaked since I bought her. No big deal, as the bilge pump was able to keep up with the leak. Tried to tighten the plastic/nylon packing gland but too far gone, the rudder shaft was badly rusting away, so it wasn't gonna get any better. Time to pull the rudders too. Took the rudders down to Phillips Metal Shop in Dayton and he is currently making me a set of stainless rudders. Ordered new stuffing boxes & cutlass bearings. Figured as long as it was apart, I'd service the Hynautics hydraulic steering system, as the cylinder is leaking. Now the problems start. I don't know if this is the factory steering system the boat was manufactured with. It is a Hynautics 3 line pressurized system, which did at one time, have a Hynautics Auto pilot feature. (it has since been dis-abled & removed) It has a Model R-06 pressure reservoir, the kind with a "tire valve" on the top of it to apply compressed air. It has a cylinder that has a clevis pin on the cylinder body end, and the rod end is threaded, which has a ball clevis screwed on it for the rudder's tie rods.
I have searched every web site that carries Tele-flex, SeaStar, etc... and cannot find a cylinder that looks like mine. I would much rather rebuild it with a new seal kit since the prices I have seen for new cylinder range from $500-$1000 !!! But I don't know what to buy anyway ! The cylinder has been repainted twice, and the sticker, part number, data tag are long gone. Is this thing so old that these parts are no longer available? Will I have to re-design it for a newer system?

[jralbert]

Jim.. you are one hard working Marinette mechanic!! COngrats on the updates so far. On the steering question, take a few sharp pictures (the ones you posted are soft focus) and contact the support folks at Hynautics (or their successor). From what I've heard, they are anxious to help and the last time I saw their web site (some years ago), replacement parts were available. There hasn't been much change in the technology. Good luck and happy New Year

Update: a quick google search found this: http://www.seastarsolutions.com/support ... l-support/

[bill]

Jim it looks like your doing a great job of bringing the old gal back to life.

Well Jim pretty sure Marinette offered Hyd steering as an option.
And Seastar still supports Hynautics. (thanks jralbert)
http://www.seastarsolutions.com/support ... /#cylinder

Look on page 11 of this manual. They only list two cylinders. You could measure old cylinder and compare it with one of these.
http://www.seastarsolutions.com/wp-cont ... 43319J.pdf

Looks like the only repair kit offered for these cylinders is a rod seal kit.
Good Luck
bill

[javalin390]

Thank you very much Gentlemen. The pictures on page 11 and page 34 are my cylinder, at least it looks like it. I had suspected that this was a factory set-up, as most newer Hynautics installation kits use that synthetic nylon tubing for the hydraulic lines, where as mine was built with a very elaborate and well thought out copper tubing layout, the craftsmanship of which is very good. No hack conversion here ! As bad as the steering system was, it's a wonder that I could turn the steering wheel at all. I know the photo's aren't the best, but I had to reduce them to these fuzzy images because when I tried to post then, the site kept kicking them out with an error code stating that the jpegs was too big?? (too many KB ?) The rusty end of the cylinder of the upper photo is the ball clevis where the cylinder hard mounts to the hull's framework and that pin is so rusted, it AIN'T movin' !! I tried to work on it yesterday (1-1-16...Happy new year) but up here on Lake Erie, it was 28* F, everything was frozen, and I gave up. Oh well...in the spring.

[bill]

Kroil or PB blaster work if give time. Now is the time to soak the sh&% out of the frozen pins,
lol
Lets us know of your progress in the spring.
bill

[Busia]

Good luck, once again proof that lots of time and money to fix most things. And you are better off to do it yourself because it's impossible to find a good mechanic. Wanted to warn you to make sure the copper lines are all isolated from the aluminum of the boat. You will have bad corrosion right away if they touch. You can get aluminum tubing or stainless if you want to change anything. Use lots of grease or zinc anti-seize when you put it all back together.
I know about pics being too big. I use shrink pic to make them fit. You did good to get any pics included. Everybody fights with it. --Ed

[bolsado]

Hi all,

My first post and trying to figure forum out cant seem to post a new topic.

I need to locate a replacement schraeder air valve to the reservoir tank. Upon pumping air during the bleeding process it holds pressure upon releasing the connection at the valve I lose the air pressure. I see similar items available as part of air suspension kits for cars such as at summit or jegs

FYI backstory : I just splashed my new to me 32 sedan. I transported from Hot Springs AR to Phoenix AZ. Upon loading to my trailer I had fly bridge removed in AR and I disconnected the hyd lines from the flybridge helm. Lesson #1 to others I learned is dont disconnect these, just removed the wheel and the helm pump with the lines attached and secure for transport and it will save all the air bleeding problems. Upon searching the ol interweb I came up with a few bleeding directions for the hynautic 3 line system. Lesson #2 color code your hyd lines and index your pump to the dash. I taped the lines to hold as i found them, but upon removing the helm pump i realized its not marked in a way that you can remember exactly which way it was installed. Lesson #3 tape a mark on your cylinder to note relative movement

Basic steps are, remove connecting of steering cylinder at rudders so cylinder will freely move, fill reservoir with proper hyd fluid, loosen the purge relief screws, bleed the lines successively from the upper helm to the lower helm and then at the cylinder then rotate wheel 60 rotations also moving successively to lower helms then 60 in the opposite direction, close the purge screws and turn until cylinder shows movement

Lesson #4 have a helper and bleed pump into a bucket. One can do this yourself but, I lost half a pint of fluid upon my first pressurization when I had a flybridge line cracked a bit loose during bleeding before I could get up to the flybridge and cinch it back down.

Lesson #5: Upon failure and giving up in working by myself the 115 degree temps here for 4 hours I went back to the ol interweb to see what I did wrong the first time. I found others learned to turn the wheels at least one hundred times during the purge if you have a flybridge.

2nd time around got it right.

Got helpers, corrected the crisscrossed lines and labeled with color coded electrical tape, marked the helm pump against the dash, marked the cylinder shaft with elec tape, did every thing in the correct order, during the purging process if you have a helper you can see the bubbles, hear the purging occur during the wheel rotation step. I wound up doing 300 rotations in each directions until I saw no air bubbles left.

PS called the seastar help line, they returned call during the typing of this and they say the part number for the valve is HP6122 and the valve and plug assembly is HP6040.

[bcassedy]

Live, learn, and now, by virtue of your last entry, teach.
Good job!!! Hope all goes well. I just rebuilt the lower helm steering of my sedan bridge. I followed the instructions I pulled off the web / hynautic's site back when I did the upper helm rebuild. Those instructions only called for a 40 turn rotation. I think you're on to something when you did the higher number as I found that, even after a supposed successful bleed procedure, after some time had passed, the upper station's steering was non-existent. Rebleed corrected that. So you're many time past 40 process would appear to be on target.

Bill

[javalin390]

Almost forgot that I started this post !! Thanks to Bill Cassedy for bringing the subject back up, so I will update what I accomplished. Rob, the fella in Dayton, did a beautiful job on the stainless steel rudders, craftsmanship was spectacular. Put them in with new packing glands & GFO packing...My bilge is now DRY !!! The steering cylinder was, as I figured, so old that no parts or replacement cylinders were available. Luckily there is a place close by where I work (in the Cleveland area) that sells hydraulic seals for every cylinder on planet earth. So I went ahead & rebuilt it myself. I replaced the worn o-ring seals with the much better X type "Quad-ring" type seals. Shouldn't ever have to fix it again. (hopefully) Bead blasted & polished all the machined surfaces & repainted the outside of the cylinder. The pivot bearing, that mounts the fixed end of the cylinder, was easily located from an online bearing company (it's used literally on hundreds of industrial machine applications). All said & done, probably have less than $400 in it, that includes the stainless rudders ! I did luck out as far as the bleeding procedure goes, since I only had the cylinder off, it didn't take much fluid, or work, to bleed it out. Bought a little foot operated bicycle tire pump, to air up the hydraulic reservoir, and it is small enough to keep on the boat with the rest of my tools. Sandblasted, polished and painted all the remaining parts and gave her a "rear end alignment". Steers straight and you can turn the wheel with your finger.