ST1000 / ST2000 Raymarine Tiller Pilot Thrust Cap G004
Description
Our autopilot gave up the ghost when the connector became detached from the tiller. It immediately became obvious why it broke and that this is unlikely to be an isolated incident. The original thrust cap is hollow through the thread where the highest load or stress would be. The thread even has a very obvious neck which seems to have no purpose other than to weaken the cap further. Guess what? A genuine replacement part is available. Judging by the cost I can only assume the replacement part is made from some sort of rare earth and highly scarce element. Although it does look suspiciously like the original made from ordinary plastic. Since Raymarine call this part the “thrust cap” one would have thought they may have considered not making the centre hollow and also leaving off the neck!! Very much a case of “there is a clue in the name”!!! Anyways, I decided to make my own replacement part out of PLA rather than deplete the earths resources of rare and expensive black plastic looking stuff. My version has an inner ring so that it snaps positively into place when used. The thread is slightly off pitch so that it screws in freely until close to the end where it starts to bind up to provide a “nyloc” type effect. I gave it 9 perimeters for strength and used 0.2 layer height.
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