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DM2 gearchange mechanism


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I'm putting a back cabin into our boat which involves altering the engine room bulkhead from a side door to a central one, from which you step left to the engine room corridor. Unfortunately that puts the gearchange mechanism for the PRM right in the wrong place. Which is a shame because it's a very neat system; a little set of linkages connected to a substantial steel bar that runs up to the push-pull rod. It looks 'proper' and works smoothly but that bar is real obstacle to getting in and out of the cabin.

I'd be very interested to know how other people's controls work - photos would be really helpful. Thanks

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  • 2 years later...

After a gap doing more pressing jobs I've returned to this one. I have some amassed some pics but haven't yet found a solution which doesn't involve an expensive trip to someone like Tony Redshaw!  As I said in my OP we've moved the engine forward and built a back cabin so the old set up of linkages at the 'box end connected to a flat steel bar that runs up to the push-pull rod is not in the right place any more so I've pretty much got a blank canvas from the control rod to the PRM.

Photos of other set-ups would be much appreciated.

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This is going to be hard to explain but - on my old boat (with similar DM2) the trad controls ran via rods along the ceiling into a box just inside the engine room, then two cables ran down the bulkhead and disappeared under the floor, appearing at the engine and acting on the gearbox and speed control as if they came from a Morse lever. This had the added benefit of there being no rods or chains dropping down from the ceiling getting in the way of things. (I actually had to have a Morse lever fitted eventually as my wife preferred that to the 'normal' trad controls - this was so easy to do as all it required, apart from the morse lever, was extra length cables). The only drawback I could see was having to carry a couple of spare cables 'just in case'.

This was built by Stoke Boats (quite a while ago) but a phone call to them might work in your favour.

(And, No, I don't have any photos!)

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5 minutes ago, Mike Tee said:

This is going to be hard to explain but - on my old boat (with similar DM2) the trad controls ran via rods along the ceiling into a box just inside the engine room, then two cables ran down the bulkhead and disappeared under the floor, appearing at the engine and acting on the gearbox and speed control as if they came from a Morse lever. This had the added benefit of there being no rods or chains dropping down from the ceiling getting in the way of things. (I actually had to have a Morse lever fitted eventually as my wife preferred that to the 'normal' trad controls - this was so easy to do as all it required, apart from the morse lever, was extra length cables). The only drawback I could see was having to carry a couple of spare cables 'just in case'.

This was built by Stoke Boats (quite a while ago) but a phone call to them might work in your favour.

(And, No, I don't have any photos!)

That is a smashing idea, my old boat had rods cranks and shafts from the ceiling down to the engine and they were a pain as they got the laundry greasy on wash day.

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8 minutes ago, Mike Tee said:

This is going to be hard to explain but - on my old boat (with similar DM2) the trad controls ran via rods along the ceiling into a box just inside the engine room, then two cables ran down the bulkhead and disappeared under the floor, appearing at the engine and acting on the gearbox and speed control as if they came from a Morse lever. This had the added benefit of there being no rods or chains dropping down from the ceiling getting in the way of things. (I actually had to have a Morse lever fitted eventually as my wife preferred that to the 'normal' trad controls - this was so easy to do as all it required, apart from the morse lever, was extra length cables). The only drawback I could see was having to carry a couple of spare cables 'just in case'.

This was built by Stoke Boats (quite a while ago) but a phone call to them might work in your favour.

(And, No, I don't have any photos!)

Sounds a good idea - did that give you the requisite 'feel' for the gearchange? And did you have a box for each rod, one either side, or were the rods adjacent to each other?

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Yes, feel was fine - there was a slight rotation between forward and reverse, so it took the guesswork out - from forward, pull back and when in neutral you had to rotate the lever anticlockwise maybe 1/2 inch, and then it would pull back to reverse. Throttle was also fine, probably about 6 full turns from idle to Christ that's loud!

There was only one box and I never had to really get into it, so can't even begin to describe it. I'm betting Stoke Boats have got some drawings if they could be persuaded to dig them out.

Found a couple of old photos but they don't tell much.

 

control rods.JPG

Trad controls.jpg

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