The original idea for the design came from Chuck Arnold, a P-19 owner in Bend, OR. He designed a stainless steel bracket for his existing one piece rudder and had it fabricated by a local metal worker. A variant of Chuck's rudder is now offered by IdaSailor in Boise, ID.

I used the same vertical lift concept but designed the rudder from scratch. The foil is built from laminated cedar and covered with a layer of 6 oz. fiberglass cloth. The brackets are built from 6061 aluminum.

The final weight came in at 21 lbs, 2 lbs less than the factory unit. I estimated that the additional volume adds about 2 more lbs of floatation, so the effective weight is 4 lbs less. Less stern weight on a Potter is a good thing.

Here is my design assistant checking over the plans.