Nice work, Jim. Great to see those new parts.

I don't know what I would replace these parts with. Luckily, just big chunks of bronze, they last. The morning of my cockpit install, I pulled the quadrant off the rudder post. I think I attempted to maintain this box a few years ago, and failed with the tight working space. The rudder shaft, stainless steel, is 1 1/2" dia. or more.

Loosen two bolts and off the quadrant went. A couple big pipe wrenches from the house(sorry for the marks, I've never seen a tool for these boxes - I have 2), and it loosened easily enough.

But first; see the threaded hole at the base? That has a large grease fitting(I removed it to clean). The fitting has no ball and spring inside(that close off the small grease port - like typical grease fittings), just a very small but open, hole. I went to find a replacement and struck out. It's a large body fitting(maybe metric as well), and I couldn't find it locally.

My question is, did it ever have a ball/ spring inside? Is it possible that the large plug of grease - 1/2" x 1" round recess inside the bronze fitting - keeps water out? Keep in mind, this box is above the waterline and gets immersed sailing, at times, but little water pressure. It's never leaked through that fitting but the grease fitting may have been plugged with junk. Any thoughts?

Back to the packing gland: Sure enough, nobody has been inside this gland in some time. I doubt the packing was sealing (but maybe), but I never noticed much leaking(any actually).

It's all cleaned up and packed with a fat ring(all it would take) of 5/16" best flax packing there is. Plus I pumped in about a quarter of a tube of gun grease. The barn door swings nicely, now.