After sailing for a couple of years on Dasein, it became clear that a new tiller shape was in order. The current oak tiller—besides being aesthetically unpleasing—was functionally deficient. The shape was very flat and the tiller exited the tiller head at much too low of an angle, leaving the tiller well below the height of the cockpit seats. Further, the tiller was quite slender and did not inspire confidence with regards to strength.

Team Tillers

Tim Lackey was also in need of a new tiller for the upcoming season, and since we had both boats together at his shop, we spent some time discussing a design philosophy, thinking that we could build two essentially identical tillers. After some initial discussions Tim took a stab at creating a mock-up. Over a few weeks we refined the shape. You can read about the design process here.

We initially had some problems with the cold moulding process. The first strips were just ripped off the edge of an 8/4 mahogany board. This had the grain running in the wrong direction and we were unable to force the strips to the mold without splitting. However once Tim resawed the board correctly he was able to glue up with no problems, and delivered the blank to me for shaping.

Finished Shape Develops

Once I had the blank I cut the tiller to length based on the luan template that Tim had created. I planed the tiller to the correct thickness based on the tiller bracket, then got ready to shape the blank.

I first scribed a center line on the top of the blank. from here I estimated the basic shape of the tiller and roughed it in on once side with a pencil. I took offset measurements and transfered them to the other side. I didn't worry about getting a perfect line as it was just a rough guide. I then planed the sides of the tiller with a hand plane until they were fair and matched the guides I had drawn.

Once this was done I roughed in the shape that I wanted as viewed from the side. I wanted to have the handle section smaller than the rest of the tiller, and I wanted the very end to flare out a bit so that it was larger than the handle. Once the shape was established with pencil guide marks, I planed things down to match the curve I had drawn. I ended up removing almost 2 full strips from the underside of the tiller in the handle area. I did my best to make a nice fair curve.

The next step was to start rounding everything over. Again, I wanted the handle area of the tiller to be nicely rounded to almost an egg shape so that it would fit nicely in the hand. However I also waned to leave the rest of the tiller quite square, with just a quarter inch roundover on all the edges.

I spent some time easing all the edges and getting the shape of the handle just right. I then turned to shaping the the very end of the handle, basically allowing it to quickly flare from the egg shape of the handle to a rounded square shape. I also found that I needed to slightly flatten the the first curve aft of the handle in order to get the shape to look just right to the eye. Please note that the phots don't seem to really show the shape that well—the rounded section is more rounded than it appears in the pictures.

After this I spent a few minutes sanding the tiller down to 220 grit in preparation for varnish. Once this was done I drilled the mounting holes for the tiller bracket and began laying on the varnish. I only applied 4 coats of varnish at this time, as I wanted to get the tiller on board. At the end of the season additional coats can be added.

Once the varnish work was finished I took the tiller out to the boat. The bracket was attached to the tiller and then to the tiller head. Nothing special about the installation.

Usage Report

Once the tiller was installed I was very pleased with the result. As designed, the tiller exited the tiller head and quickly swept up to a usable height. This left a very nice, long section to serve as a handle. Additionally it gave the tiller plenty of clearance over the cockpit seats and the knees of anyone sitting on the cockpit seats. Compare the old knee "clearance" with the new tiller's knee clearance.

Another nice feature of the new shape is the access afforded to the engine panel when the tiller is in a "stowed" position. When folded up out of the way, the curve near the bracket allowed me to reach in and start the engine without pulling the tiller down. A minor detail, but nice.

Under sail the tiller performed admirably. The long raised section allowed for steering comfortably from a variety of positions. Steering by foot was still possible and relatively comfortable, especially from the low side.

The only negative aspect of the new design related to the use of the tiller pilot. Due to the overall height of the new tiller, use of the tiller pilot would require a riser underneath the pilot in order to align the actuator arm with the tiller. A minor inconvenience considering how infrequently we use the tiller pilot.