Are paper charts still necessary and relevant?

[oceanfroggie]

so what's the consensus then, give tutors a steer to focus courses on more up to date means of passage planning and pilotage? i.e. get skippers used to using electronic means from the off rather than faffing about with charts, dividers and the like in the classroom?
Finish off the course with "this is how we used to do it in the dark ages" but worthwhile knowing as you may find yourself needing the methods once in a blue moon.

Of course that'll require a fairly significant investment on their part to give course attendees plotters, PC's, Ipads and the like to work with so I can envisage the reluctance to do so

The strange thing is I did one of the old astro navigation courses (ie YM ocean) some years ago just for fun and to learn the "old way" even though I knew it was totally obsolete and something I would never use. I just wanted to learn it for fun before they stop teaching it.

One still needs to learn basic navigation skills and teaching that on paper is more demonstrative than on a plotter (ie its easier to teach the concepts and for folks to practice by physically doing things with a chart, plotter, pencil and HBC). Not all folks have good spatial relations, and some find grasping concepts in their head like compass rose, variation, and tidal effects difficult unless they see what they are doing. But I agree use of electronics need to be more core on navigation courses nowadays rather than an add-on.

 

[DAKA]

Boats have two engines in case one fails.
When both fail .......and they do .........you have the RNLI.
When your second/Third plotter/Ipiddle etc fails,lacking a map and a magnet your fall back is what exactly ?
Lady Luck presumably.

Isnt it far more likely your paper charts are going to blow away than...............

Sat nav 1 fail
sat nav 2 fail
GPS 3 (no external power source, kept in the oven) fail
gps 4 (phone)

Ipad (no external power source , can also be used as a sat nav and simulated GPS 5)
Laptop (not external power source, can be used as plotter)

Compass 1 (upper helm)
compass 2 (lower helm)
compass 3 (dinghy BDH)
compass 4 (sighting compass)
compass 5 (autohelm)

If all electronic navigation fails I have recorded (updated every 1/2 hour)

Magnetic course to steer
current log
distance to next WP

 

[Tender_aft]

so what's the consensus then, give tutors a steer to focus courses on more up to date means of passage planning and pilotage? i.e. get skippers used to using electronic means from the off rather than faffing about with charts, dividers and the like in the classroom?
Finish off the course with "this is how we used to do it in the dark ages" but worthwhile knowing as you may find yourself needing the methods once in a blue moon.

Of course that'll require a fairly significant investment on their part to give course attendees plotters, PC's, Ipads and the like to work with so I can envisage the reluctance to do so

As with everything in life, if you understand the underlying theory, it makes everything clearer whether you use paper or electronics (in this case). Schools teach us so much that we think we don't need, then every now and then a piece of old knowledge comes in useful.

How many people come unstuck because they are flippant about the theory and background of what they do. In boating terms that can have dire consequences. If you know the background theory you are better prepared.
eg.
- If you know Dos, you can fix things in Windows more easily. So many people throw their arms in the air when they can no longer point and click.
- If you know that a carrot grows in the ground, you can probably make a meal when your freezer stops working, ruining all your ready meals.
- If your car or boat stops working, and you know that it takes fuel and a spark to work, you can check your fuel lines and electrics when stuck in the middle of nowhere with no chance of help to get you going again.

For those who go boating in familiar waters/lands, these things are less important. For those who step outside of their comfort zone, it makes very good sense to be self sufficient.

Paper for me is a back up, but for unknown waters I would use it in parallel. I still keep a world map on the wall so the kids have a better spatial awareness, of where they are in the world at any point in time. If I decided to cross oceans, I would get a sextant too, to cover the risk of water logged charts. Everything is relevant to your own situation; each person judges what they need to do, but will find out in time whether they were right or wrong (that last bit sounds like a harbinger of doom comment LOL )

 

[oldgit]

Isnt it far more likely your paper charts are going to blow away than...............

Sat nav 1 fail
sat nav 2 fail
GPS 3 (no external power source, kept in the oven) fail
gps 4 (phone)

Ipad (no external power source , can also be used as a sat nav and simulated GPS 5)
Laptop (not external power source, can be used as plotter)

Compass 1 (upper helm)
compass 2 (lower helm)
compass 3 (dinghy BDH)
compass 4 (sighting compass)
compass 5 (autohelm)

If all electronic navigation fails I have recorded (updated every 1/2 hour)

Magnetic course to steer
current log
distance to next WP

One is in complete admiration of your confidence and reliance that something that needs volts and a satellite signal to get you and yours home will never fail.

 

[Tender_aft]

If all electronic navigation fails I have recorded (updated every 1/2 hour)

Magnetic course to steer
current log
distance to next WP

But what do you record CTS, current log and distance to next WP on?

 

[DAKA]

One is in complete admiration of your confidence and reliance that something that needs volts and a satellite signal to get you and yours home will never fail.

I dont rely on the gps signal.

if the gps signal fails I have no need to grab a paper chart.

I maintain course to steer (I would have to use a compass)
I check the time and calculate the new distance to next WP
I follow the course until time is up and I am at the WP, exactly as you would do with a paper chart.

By teh time I am at that way point I will have got the
IPAD
Laptop to check next wp

by this time I am almost certainly in sight of land (dont usually have wp 20 miles offshore !) and the ipad will have automatically acquired an accurate triangulated position , I have an ipad Navionics virtual plotter without GPS.

As a back up I have the laptop and would have to use Belfield to find next course to steer and use the compass.

I can do that taking account of the tide quicker than you can with a paper chart.

(I do have paper charts on board but at this stage (no gps signal)still feel they are redundant) .

 

[DAKA]

But what do you record CTS, current log and distance to next WP on?

Paper log with waterproof pencil, egg timer set 1/2 hour , details taken off gps .

 

[Tender_aft]

Paper log with waterproof pencil, egg timer set 1/2 hour , details taken off gps .

Ahaaaa! (only teasing. I was hoping you would say Etch-a-Sketch )

I like the egg timer idea.

 

[DAKA]

Ahaaaa! (only teasing. I was hoping you would say Etch-a-Sketch )

I like the egg timer idea.

water proof Egg timers are currently being given away free with water companies (designed to time yourself in the shower to save water )


I wonder how many of the "you will drop off the end of the world without paper charts" actually bother to record a log , without basic log and gps signal the paper charts are redundant anyway.

 

[Nick_H]

Boats have two engines in case one fails.
When both fail .......and they do .........you have the RNLI.
When your second/Third plotter/Ipiddle etc fails,lacking a map and a magnet your fall back is what exactly ?
Lady Luck presumably.

.. but the engines aren't completely independent, they use the same source of power, and the same fuel, and if both fail at the same time you can bet your life it's due to something they share. A plotter, hand held GPS, and an ipad on the other hand are completely independent. Lets be really pessimistic and say the chance of any one of these failing on any particular trip is 100 to 1. That means the chance of all three failing is a million to 1. OK, it's possible that the global GPS system could stop working, but I can still use the electronic chart to navigate using dead reckoning and/or manual fixes, as I would have to do with a paper chart anyway.

 

[prv]

Don't forget that all of us with recent iPhones etc actually have a backup positioning system to GPS.

A few years ago the Russians got a bit miffed that everybody was ignoring their GLONASS system in favour of the American GPS. So they passed a law imposing heavy import taxes on any device brought into Russia which used GPS signals but not GLONASS. Of course, trendy Muscovites all want the latest smartphones just as much as anybody else, and Apple and Samsung didn't want to have to pay this import tax, so they quietly incorporated GLONASS into their kit. You won't find it mentioned in any flashy TV adverts, but if you take a close look at the detailed spec sheets you will find that every iPhone since (I think) the 4S has had GLONASS support, as have other manufacturers' equivalents. So if GPS suddenly disappears, it will just keep rolling via the Russian system.

Of course there are things that could screw up both sets of signals...

Pete

 

[Nick_H]

It is difficult on a plotter, to see a five/six hour journey, not that anyone seems to do them anymore.

A chart gives you the big picture. With a plotter you have to keep zooming in and out and it can be easy to miss a rock.

A chart only has one level of zoom, so if it gives you the big picture, it doesn't give you the detail, and vice versa. To plan a long journey with charts you need several of them, a small scale to plan the route, and some large scale to check for hazards. With an ipad it's much easier, you set your route, and then at all the points along the way where there could be a hazard you move your fingers apart to zoom in, then move them back together again to zoom out. You can check several potential hazards on a route in a few seconds, and you can zoom in and out to understand their relative positions. My last trip was 210 NM through a series of islands and round several headlands, with an overnight on the way, and i didn't even consider getting the charts out to plan it.

The latest plotters will also warn you if you've planned a route that goes too close to shallow water, and the very latest will even plan the route for you, and let you review it to see if you're happy with it.

 

[hlb]

A chart is about three foot wide. How big is your plotter?

 

[prv]

A chart only has one level of zoom, so if it gives you the big picture, it doesn't give you the detail, and vice versa.

This is true, but omits an important factor - the human cartographer who decided what to show and what to miss out.

I mostly use Imray rather than Admiralty, but with these at least, my experience has been that there are rarely or never "hidden" hazards that are relevant to what I might be doing with that chart. If something is in the middle of a wide area where you would reasonably be using a small-scale chart, then that something will be shown, even if it's relatively small. Similarly, the major lights that you probably care about at that stage of the passage, but not the harbour entry lights for which you will have switched to the approach chart. No plotter I've seen can make that kind of intelligent decision - each type of chart object is hidden or displayed at a given zoom level, and that's that. Yes, you can zoom in to check around harbours and places where your route skirts the coast, but if there's an outlying rock or some tidal overfalls in the middle of a leg then you won't know about it unless you laboriously pan along every inch of the course at a fairly close zoom.

They're also better at intelligently fitting a lot of detail into a small space where it's necessary, angling the buoyage symbols around each other, bending text along a harbour wall, etc. Navionics (for example) just splats all the symbols down on top of each other, and if it's a complicated harbour with a lot of objects then you may need to zoom in very close indeed to separate them, losing the sense of perspective that you need. Only last week, I was crabbing towards the east entrance at Cherbourg, using the projected track line on the plotter to ensure that we were sliding correctly into the middle of the western half. However, I could barely pick out the entrance on the plotter screen because it was showing all the marks on the Ile Pelee, and their light sectors, and various other lines and symbols in which I had no interest whatsoever. The equivalent Imray chartlet is much more readable.

I assume plotter display software will get better at this over time, but for now I'm happy to benefit from a professional's judgement of what to show and what to omit.

Pete

 

[DAKA]

. but I can still use the electronic chart to navigate using dead reckoning and/or manual fixes, as I would have to do with a paper chart anyway.

except it will take you a fraction of the time the electronic way and you dont have to come off the plane to do it

 

[lotusman]

This is true, but omits an important factor - the human cartographer who decided what to show and what to miss out.

....

I assume plotter display software will get better at this over time, but for now I'm happy to benefit from a professional's judgement of what to show and what to omit.

Pete

I agree with all you say - which is why I have raster Admiralty on my plotter as well as a vector alternative.

Zoom means I rarely need the reading specs tied to the chart table.

 

[DAKA]

A chart is about three foot wide. How big is your plotter?

In reality Haydan, how often did you have it open 3 foot wide.
when I used to use them they would be folded in 6 to fit waterproof displays.
it was almost impossible to fold to the bit you needed with a scale or lat/long edge readings on view so navigation was almost useless, at best a rough finger on the pencil line but my finger kept jumping all over the place each time I hit a wave.
Electronics dont suffer from either problems, the 'X' has the lat/long clearly visible.

 

[Nick_H]

A chart is about three foot wide. How big is your plotter?

It hadn't escaped me that a chart is bigger than an electronic screen, but the chart doesn't zoom in and out, so as SWMBO keeps telling me, size isn't everything ...

I suspect you're comparing planning with charts to planning with an old plotter you had on the P35, and in that comparison i'd agree with you, but technology moves on, and if you tried planning the same route on an ipad, you may be surprised at just how quick and effective it is.

 

[prv]

In reality Haydan, how often did you have it open 3 foot wide.

Mine are always opened out fully, on my nice dry chart table.

But I have a sailing yacht, on which 6.5 knots counts as "quite fast".

If I had a fast motorboat, underway I would use a plotter exclusively, no doubt whatsoever.

Pete

 

[oceanfroggie]

One is in complete admiration of your confidence and reliance that something that needs volts and a satellite signal to get you and yours home will never fail.

Volts, radio signals, Jet A1, etc, have been getting all of us safely around the skies for decades.