50-55ft Fly docking-mooring with only 2 persons?

One of the best training sessions I had was with tom Gregory (anyone remember Tom?). As we walked along the pontoon and stood next to the boat, Tom said, 'OK, Piers, tell me which will have the grater effect when you come to cast off. The wind or the tide?' A great question, and one which makes you think and plan.
 
Piers said:
One of the best training sessions I had was with tom Gregory (anyone remember Tom?). As we walked along the pontoon and stood next to the boat, Tom said, 'OK, Piers, tell me which will have the grater effect when you come to cast off. The wind or the tide?' A great question, and one which makes you think and plan.
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In Greece definitely the wind??‍♂️
 
Don't become obsessed with rear cockpit controls or remotes.

I have rear cockpit controls. I use them only to tighten the bow line ( reverse ) or push away form the dock if we have drifted too close ( rare as we tie up Wirth very long lines to make the bow line simpler).

I have never taken the boat in from below as personally I loose overall situational awareness. The boat can twist and at the stern you will see little difference, whereas at the bow it will be meters to port or stbd. You have a much better view of what is going on from the flybridge and if you need to edge the boat in that is fine also - the crew just pushes away a bit - bear in mind their real job is keeping the fenders down as the bows of the other boats act as lead in anyway.

They have a use, but personally I use them I guess 30% of the time and then for pretty minor adjustments.

I made a dock mate ( the parts are about £150 and the way they work is simple) but I rarely used that either.

Honestly learn to drive the boat. If you want more toys then that is fine but don't rely on them. A dock mate is about £4k last time I looked. Great for single handing.
 
I reckon you can always tell when a skipper knows what he is doing when manoeuvring a flybridge boat.
Anyone sitting down at the flybridge helm isn't going to be fully aware (spatially) of the situation.
Again, as I said above, it is all about watching the momentum.
I stand up and walk around the fb - looking over the sides, watching the bow and stern in relation to the dock etc.
Make adjustments by putting the engines in and out again - always keeping things slow.
Thrusters used only to correct things.

Next time you watch someone dock.
If they are sitting down, there will be problems.
If they are standing and moving around, - IMO that is the sign of someone that knows what he is doing.
 
Best way to get good at mooring up is to learn how to do it with just one engine - very exciting. Best to have an experienced teacher, not something you want to learn by experiment or the hard way if you loose an engine one day. Med mooring is your friend on such days as squeezing in between makes life so much easier than trying to get between two fixed pontoons or along side.
When you can do that, nothing will bother you.
 
How could you dock it sitting down!

I have never really seen anyone do it but that would be tricky indeed!

I moored up from the lower helm once in a storm with a load a marineros on board ( I was moving as it was blowing a 7 and Andraxt had waves in the marina. I could not walk from one end to the other of the boat). The upper helm was missing - refurb in progress - and alarms were going off everywhere as half the EVC system was disconnected.

Without going into detail lets say It didn't go well and I won't be docking from the lower helm ever again!
 
jrudge said:
How could you dock it sitting down!
I have never really seen anyone do it but that would be tricky indeed!
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+1, but I can see Hurricane's point, because I did witness that, in a very few cases.
The most remarkable one was many years ago, but I still remember that as if it happened yesterday
Do you remember the restaurant where we docked in Levrnaka, the first island where we overnighted in Kornati Park, before going to Piskera Marina, just a few miles South?
Back in my early Croatian years there was no floating dock, just some buoys for securing the bow, before bringing the stern lines to some rings ashore
There we were, already moored with the old lady, when an Azimut pointed towards us, with the helmsman comfortably sat on the f/b and shouting to a much younger lady.
Who struggled a bit to grab the buoy, but eventually made it, and secured the boat to it with a line just long enough to reach the bow cleat.
The boss then began reversing towards the shore, going worryingly close to my boat on his sbtd side first, and then an SL72 on his port side.
By then, both ourselves and the SL crew were out with as many rowing fenders as we could handle.
After managing to align the Azi enough to reverse ashore, where a chap of the restaurant was waiting to grab the stern lines, he shouted again at the lady, instructing her to throw the line ashore.
Which she did - all of it. I kid you not.
The local guy ashore, after realizing that 1) the lady couldn't find another line, and 2) the line that she threw to him was nowhere near long enough, in spite of the helmsman attempt to drag the buoy ashore by reversing, eventually jumped onboard the SL (which was upwind to the Azi), made a bowline which he passed to the lady, asking her to put it round the cleat (which was within her capability - just), and then secured it to the SL midship cleat.
Done that, he asked the Azi crew to wait, went to search for some lines, jumped in a rib, replaced the buoy line with a longer one, and eventually secured the boat ashore with stern lines.
During all this time, the helmsman never stood up from his f/b seat, and all he did was shouting to the lady that he had plenty of other lines, and she should have looked better.
No tip that they might have given to the dock hand was too high... ?
 
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Hurricane said:
BTW, on our last boat I did once dock using the lower helm.
As you say - never again!!!
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Well, the f/b is obviously hard to beat, in terms of situational awareness.
But with my old lady, whose internal visibility was pretty decent and had a side door right along the lower helmsman position, I did it regularly.
Not frequently, but regularly, because off-season I used to fully cover the flybridge, and the hassle of re-opening the covers was more than the concern of helming from inside.

Never tried with the DP, though - not yet, anyway.
BTW, according to the builder, the position of internal throttles and thruster controls was meant to make them accessible also from the walkaround, leaving the sliding window open.
Which allows the helmsman to deal with the mooring lines while still have the controls within easy reach.
But that's a Venetian thing, more than anything else. Not anxious to give it a try, TBH...!
 
I beg to differ as I regularly dock sitting down but for a different reason...
f/b controls are THAT hard that you cannot just click to engage/disengage f/w or reverse with a simple movement. you have to have the right angle on your arm else you may end up going way up on revs and you don't really want that.
so in/out of gear is done sitting, then depends how easy things are, sitting or standing.\
Visibility from lower helm is bad, only done it once or twice in the rain. Also no marineros here and none to help :(
really have to replace the morse cables but that means taking all the salon/lower helm ceiling and side panels off, not too keen on doing it now, maybe next winter...

V.
 
Vas, what you are saying definitely suggests that your cables to f/b levers are due for replacement.
But generally speaking, even when all components work well, mechanical levers are always less smooth in the f/bridge compared to the p/house, at least for simple length reasons, but often also tight curves.
One thing you may consider is the installation of separate levers for gear and throttles, which btw you could find used at half decent prices.
On top of being a bit smoother, since each lever only deals with one cable rather than two, they eliminate completely the problem that you mention of revving up the engine involuntarily upon gear engagement.
It does take a bit to get used to them, mind - and some folks hate them to the point of fitting electronic controls just to get rid of separate levers.
But 'fiuaskme, their no-frills design still is the best thing since sliced bread, and it's a pity that separate levers aren't available anymore with modern electronic engines.
Aside from the most sophisticated installations in very fast boats, but that's another kettle of fish.
 
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