Baystar Hydraulic Steering

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kennharriet

Member
Joined
Jan 22, 2009
Messages
543
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2
C Dory Year
1999
C Dory Model
22 Cruiser
Vessel Name
Lochsa
I am in the process of upgrading to Baystar Hydraulic steering. I have the helm pump installed and the cylinder mechanism mounted on the Honda 75 hp. Would someone mind sending me a pic of how their tubing is routed and connected to the cylinder in the splashwell on their CD22. Just a pic from the cockpit looking at the front of the motor and splashwell would be great. Thank you, Ken
 
Congrats on making the decision to change to hydraulic steering. You will enjoy the ease of steering, and how well you can hold a course.

Don't have any photos for you right now, will post later this week for you (my CD22 is not stored at my house).

I too have a Baystar hydraulic steering system installed in my CD22 and had same in my CD16 that I just sold. You will find it easy to install. Make sure you leave plenty of "loop" in the lines at the motor so the back and forth movement doesn't pinch the lines. I allowed 12" of diameter which works well.

For me, the harder portion of the install was how the tubes connect at the back of the helm. Get it right, and all is well. Get it wrong, and you get hydraulic fluid leakage. The trick is making sure the tubes at the helm have a nice gentle sweep into the fittings.

Good luck with your install. Photos coming as soon as I can.

cheers,

D
 
dgeorges,
I too would like to see those photos as upgrading to hydraulic steering is on my short list of improvements to make.
Cheers!
- Steve
 
Steve, I’ll give you a report when I get mine done. 🙂
 
kennharriet":127v5ia9 said:
Steve, I’ll give you a report when I get mine done. 🙂
Click to expand...

That would be great Ken, it's an upgrade that I would like to do soon as well, but I'll let you go first and show me how it went! :)
 
Thanks for the pic. I hate to admit it but the reason I asked is that I cut the tubing a bit short on the initial install, not realizing how much travel there is in the tubing. It would have worked but was not right so I ordered a tubing kit to redo it right. Any tricks to filling and bleeding the hydraulic fluid? Hanks again. Ken
 
And here I am feeling happy that the boat I'm looking at

Doesn't have hydraulic steering

Guess I really can't make an educated comment until I try it out

All I know is when those lines get old, they're impossible to patch

Pulled existing line from my Mako and took it to the hydraulic shop

New fitting didn't last but minutes chipper.gif
 
...have to say, hydraulic steering is nice

Depends on just how far the helm is from the transom

But I hear you, need to take one more addition into account on my purchase

This place really blows my mind on just how much info there is

Thanks

Fellow members
 
Only had two steering failures

And the second one was due to my trying to repair the broken hydraulic line
in lieu of just replacing it

Luckily both episodes were not at speed in the channel

Luckily both were while idling

And I do remember just how hard the teleflex steering was on my old Proline
where the helm was forward probably 16 feet from the big six outboard

New hydraulic is awesome

Old, not so much gerg.gif
 
Thanks Boris for the bleeding tips and fluid recommendation discussion.
 
I have the Baystar hh4314-3 steering. I feel like it should take less turning. Is this so that when you're at full throttle a tiny jiggle doesn't throw you off course?

Is it adjustable? I just looked through the manual and didn't see anything.

Thanks.
 
It is not adjustable, lock to lock is determined by the helm pump. A different helm pump would do it but that isn't very practical and it would be hard to find one that is compatible.
Changing the ram cylinder to a different fluid capacity/length might be easier, but these are sold as a balanced system kit so it would take a lot of research or find a really good expert to change it. Call the company maybe they have different kits?
 
There is a reason that the helm ratio is the same. If the helm turns without a response, then you may have air in the system. Have you checked the fluid level? This needs to be checked regularly, just like the engine oil...

There is no option to change out the helm pump or hydraulic ram for the BayStar, as there is for the more robust SeaStar. The kit comes for an engine of less than 150 hp with 5 turns lock to lock steering.

You need to find out if your helm goes more than 5 turns lock to lock. You could adapt a different pump from SeaStar, but the tubings and fittings are different.

What many of use is a "Suicide" (also known as Brody, necking, steering knob), Edson makes a nice one which clamps on the wheel, and is what I use. For example when backing the boat, I will stand in the isle, looking aft, with left hand on the "knob", and use that to steer. I would not want more sensitive steering...
 
If steering response is slow? Then you may have some air in the system, you can do a "simple" bleed by turning the wheel lock to lock slowly many times. If it gets better that is the problem, if it comes back again you have a system air leak. A shop can hook up and bleed at the cylinder for a major bleed. Like Bob said it should be a smooth (no herky jerky) 5 wheel rotations lock to lock.
I once had to replace a pump with bad internal seals that was a problem.
 
IME, doing it this way is best.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBgATO_1vl0

I've saw on a TV show that you actually need to do it twice. The second time after using it for awhile. Have to let the micro bubbles aggregate and the bleed them out.
 
That is a great video, a pro job.
You can get home so you can do the job right using the lock to lock back and forth method it will remove a lot of air and bring the helm mostly back up and you will know air is your problem.
 
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