Best basic electronics for dinghy/mini-cruiser - GPS, VHF etc

[PuppySocks]

I should have realised I'd be on dangerous ground criticising iFads

I maintain, relying upon such a toy for navigation is plain dim.

There are many people who believe a mobile phone will suffice for coms at sea, so I prefer to make quite clear the hazards of the practice, to the uninitiated.

Tell that to the Singapore Pilots, they climb on the ship get to the bridge put there IPad out and start giving helm orders. Yes they use the VHF and Radar (and AIS) they still use there mobile phone for some of there coms.

Not saying its not without its hazards, but its not without its hazards as long as as people are aware of the dangers its fine for me a Galaxy S2 in suitable case would be fine.

Moving with the times... I think its called

 

[Ravi]

http://ow.ly/t2iUv

Proper sailing! . I had a look at the link on that page showing their GPS track and there is a perfect S shape as they worked the tide!

I like the Uniden combined VHF/small screen GPS... http://ow.ly/t2nig ...but no price shown!

Looks good. It makes sense that you have gone for a submersible rather than just a waterproof (i.e. splashproof!) model. In a dinghy, it might also make sense to look for a VHF that floats. Or maybe, that is just my helming.

On the subject of dinghy cruising, inspired by Jack de Crow, I had been planning a rather mad trip to Greece in a Wayfarer over the last few months. (An idea since abandoned, as I have just bought a boat in Greece, instead!!) One thing that I looked at was fitting a ?flexible? solar panel to charge the minimal electronics that I was going to take with me. You would be able to pick up a little solar unit that will charge your phone quite cheaply.

Also, you may find that the GPS functionality is a bit of a drain on the phone battery. (On my android phone, anyway). I found that it was possible to change the GPS settings on my phone to update less frequently which prolonged the battery life. Also, shutting down (killing) all the other aplications (like Skype / Facebook, etc.) while I was out sailing made a difference. (You can just restart these apps later by clicking on them.)

Also, do you know about 'Toughcharts'? The waterproof ones? Some dinghy cruisers use them. Personally, I wouldn't bother with them since a paper chart and a bearing compass is about as much use as a dehumidifier on a singlehanded sailing dinghy if conditions get remotely interesting.
(And Elton, before you rise to the bait, imagine yourself in a dinghy on the North Sea in a Force 5. No autopilot to switch on to go and do chartwork in the nonexistent cabin and letting go of either tiller or main is the shortest way to catch up with the useless bit of flapping paper that has just blown overboard. On the other hand a lovely little Garmin/phone in its cradle can tell you not only that you are being swept out to sea, by the tide, but what your unplanned ETA in Iceland will be.)

It sounds like the chandlers will at least be getting your gold for a VHF, if not a plotter. Happy shopping.

Ravi

 

[Greenheart]

...anyone who thought that VHF made an acceptable replacement for a mobile phone there would be most unwise to do so.

Oh, and Dan, who is the dog on your avatar?

Iain, do you jest? If you've never watched BBC3 at 11pm (bit earlier at weekends), you have missed what I rate as some of the funniest entertainment I've had this century. It requires a bit of getting used to, but definitely, thoroughly, enduringly worth it. Think of it as The Simpsons without a gleam of moral conscience. Properly funny. :encouragement:

PS. thanks for confirming what I'd gathered, re phone charts vs GPS etc.

 

[Iain C]

Nope...no jest...what's the programme then?

 

[Kelpie]

Nope...no jest...what's the programme then?

Family Guy. It's my cup of tea, but not everyone's.


Re: what can you do aboard a dinghy, singlehanded, on an exciting day. IME (and this is talking about Wayfarers which are apparently as stable as your average patio, compared to other dinghies) unless you actually stop the boat in there water, you can do very little than involves your hands. You need one for the sheet and one for the tiller. I've tried to take photos and videos whilst sailing and it is far from easy. God knows that it would be like trying to use a smartphone.

I do take a waterproof phone anyway, so that when I am rowing home after the wind has died I can tell SWMBO where I am and plead with her not to give my dinner to the dog..
I've also phoned her whilst stood on the centreboard of a capsized wayfarer, which was surprisingly stable...

 

[Seajet]

Mavanier,

well there's such things as mainsheet jammers, and hooking the tiller under ones' leg; OK probably not ideal on the plane but perfectly feasible in an Osprey carrying out sensible gentle fun cruising, which I think is what Dan has in mind.

 

[mjcoon]

I've also phoned her whilst stood on the centreboard of a capsized wayfarer, which was surprisingly stable...

While dressed as James Bond, too, I hope!

Mike.

 

[Ravi]

Mavanier,

well there's such things as mainsheet jammers, and hooking the tiller under ones' leg; OK probably not ideal on the plane but perfectly feasible in an Osprey carrying out sensible gentle fun cruising, which I think is what Dan has in mind.

Yes, I had a cleating mainsheet on my Osprey. Useful for lighting tabs while underway while hooking the tiller under thigh as you describe. Unfortunately, cleating the mainsheet is also a way of conjuring up huge gusts out of nowhere and has led to some of my more spectacular osprey immersions in the waters of Kielder..

Speaking of that, I wonder if Dan has any plans to have a reefing mainsail in the Osprey. It occurs to me that I have three reefs in my Wayfarer main (and a furling genoa) which might explain why it find it much dryer than the Osprey!

 

[Seajet]

Dan's the one to ask as to latest status, but that was definitely the plan.

A chum has an old Osprey very similar to Dan's, that came with 2 mains, one with 3 reefs.

Sadly I sold my lovely MK2 years ago...

 

[Greenheart]

Gentlemen, sorry for leaving you early last night. A spot of urgent work appeared. It shouldn't have taken me eight hours, but it did.

Thank you for your interest; my current Osprey status is still very much pre-season repair & refurbishment. A few cracks to be filled & faired, rear cockpit bulkhead to be replaced with big-capacity transom drains, and I hope to paint the decks and cover the side-decks with pale Progrip, since I've heard black gets scorchingly hot in the summer sun.

Regarding low-stress cruising kit aboard a boat that was originally designed to be pretty demanding; yes, I have a jammer for the main, but I hope I'll be wakeful enough not to snooze through the arrival of gusts...

...my realisation last year that SWMBO doesn't especially want to be a vital part of the crew, led me even further along my eccentric singlehanding road. I want to be able to invite a mate or two out, without needing them to help. So I spent a week or so sewing a single, exceedingly deep reef into the more tired-looking of my mainsails...

View attachment 39430

...I'm not proud of that photo - I realise the outhaul, cunningham & kicker hadn't been touched - I wasn't sailing that day, just hoisting to see if the cringles & reef-line grommets were in the right places. But comparison with the full sail (below) shows how much of the mainsail has been flaked (fairly neatly) along the boom, when reefed as above...

View attachment 39431

...sorry that pic is on its side. I reckon that reef reduces 100sq ft of main down to about 55. Reefed, the main sets no higher on the mast than the 43sq ft genoa. And thanks to Tam Lin of this parish, I'll have the genoa on a furler too...so hopefully when necessary, I can turn 150sq ft of screeching Osprey into a very tame bird, in half a minute or so.

I'm confident that she'll steer and point quite nicely with full genoa and minimal main, because she easily sailed upwind and down under genoa alone last summer. Considering the reefed main and full genoa still represent nearly 100 sq ft but with a lower C of E, I hope she'll still feel fast, without tossing me o/b and laughing as she lies on her side for a rest.

All kinds of ideas crossed my mind as ways of controlling what is technically too big & powerful a boat for one man. Some I'm glad to have persevered with, others I gave up on...

...I won't be moulding myself a lead centreboard. But I remain satisfied that the lazyjacks are a big help when hoisting/lowering, rowing, launching and landing. So they'll stay.

Forgetting ideas which would have added lots of weight and needless complexity, has helped a lot. The clearer the cockpit will be, the happier I'll be. And the flexibility to regard the boat as a generously-canvassed flyer in light airs, yet also manageable in a breeze, is very attractive. Okay, it's nearly six months since I had to move her anywhere on her trolley, so I've probably forgotten how arduous a big boat can feel on shore if you're alone - but I can cope with that burden if I know I can manage her once afloat.

Sorry for the drift. But perhaps electronics folk here can see that my sailing won't require constant access to screens & comms...just an occasional answer to "where am I?"

 

[Iain C]

I'll give family guy a go then. I've heard good things.

Dan, difficult to see from the photo but I think there is one very important anti capsize modification you can do. The angle of your main jammer looks all wrong, it's much too high.

With load on the mainsheet, and you fully hiked, it should drop between the pawls of the cleat pretty much as it touches the side deck, not before. As it is now, if you get walloped by a gust and heel a lot, you will be waving your mainsheet hand up in the air in a futile attempt to get it to unjam. It won't, and you will swim.

There will be some wedges between the jammer and the swivel base, just remove the unnecessary ones and bolt it back on, job done. You may also try adding a longer shackle under the mainsheet block if you can't get the angles right with wedges alone. And there should be a spring there to keep the block standing upright...can't see if there is one from the photos. This is critical, but so often not set up properly!

 

[Ravi]

Dan,

Looks great. A thought about your genoa furler.

Most dinghy furlers are designed to be all or nothing. i.e. to furl the sail away but not to sail with a reefed / reduced genoa. For reefing, some dinghies have a spar and there is a guy who has come up with a cheaper plastic (garden hose) tube solution which I use on my Wayfarer.

The other thing that I found with the Osprey was that the different in setup and mast bend made a huge difference to powering up and depowering the boat. It was equivalent to putting in the first reef. I won't pretend to really understanding these dark arts but there are a few national Osprey sailors at the club and when they tinkered with the mast chocks and rig tension on my boat before races, it was like a different animal. You may already know all about this but, if not, they seem a friendly class association and are pretty active down in your neck of the woods. If you ever fancy coming way up North for one of the Osprey events on Kielder, give me a shout.

 

[JumbleDuck]

I was rescued only because my mayday was picked up by a drilling rig, well offshore, and relayed to RNLI. I'd be dead meat otherwise, so I have strong feeling on the matter.

Did you learn that it's extremely unwise to rely on VHF for distress signalling at sea, and that you should have acquired more appropriate technology - i.e. an EPIRB?

 

[Ravi]

Did you learn that it's extremely unwise to rely on VHF for distress signalling at sea, and that you should have acquired more appropriate technology - i.e. an EPIRB?

Now if you had an IPAD on board, you could have got up close to the drilling rig and used their wifi to log onto the RNLI web site and ask them directly!

 

[JumbleDuck]

Now if you had an IPAD on board, you could have got up close to the drilling rig and used their wifi to log onto the RNLI web site and ask them directly!

Or simply use its nice, shiny screen as a heliograph and send a distress message in morse.

 

[elton]

Did you learn that it's extremely unwise to rely on VHF for distress signalling at sea, and that you should have acquired more appropriate technology - i.e. an EPIRB?

I don't have an EPIRB, but I did learn from the experience:

• Installed a DSC radio
• Bought a GPS I can read without glasses (GPS 72 insead of an eTrex)
• Made a checklist to go through before weighing anchor
• Sail in the general direction of wide open sea when the going gets rough
• Don a cycling helmet when the sh.t hits the fan

 

[JumbleDuck]

I don't have an EPIRB, but I did learn from the experience:

• Don a cycling helmet when the sh.t hits the fan

Did you take a boom to the head? Ouch.

 

[Greenheart]

Here's another long, unnecessary, largely irrelevant, wilful thread drift, I'm afraid..."me and my boat"...feel free to skip this entry...

Dan, difficult to see from the photo but I think there is one very important anti capsize modification you can do. The angle of your main jammer looks all wrong, it's much too high.

Thanks for this; I think you mentioned it in the summer and I'd forgotten. The swivel-base looks to me pretty flush with the top of the centreboard case, so can't be lowered - but it should be possible to stack the block above it on top of a disk of ply, so the jammer won't be usable unless I hold the sheet low over the sidedeck. Reminder made to self.

Most dinghy furlers are designed to be all or nothing. i.e. to furl the sail away but not to sail with a reefed / reduced genoa...

I was certainly thinking of the furler in this way - for rapid and easy application/elimination of the genoa's pull when landing or overpowered...the water's usually too deep/choppy for me to put the nose to windward and leave her while I remove the rudder or hunt for the trolley. The sail has to be furled, and rolling easily beats lowering for convenience.

Singlehanded launching & landing of a big dinghy is challenging (not that I'm discouraged), and I don't mean just lugging over 20 stone up a one-in-six. Gadgets make it possible.

By the time centreboard & rudder are immersed sufficiently to allow windward progress from the beach, the boat is floating high in nearly 3 feet of water which becomes decidedly boisterous as it feels the bottom. There's no time to mess about attaching the rudder when there's over 17ft of hull obeying the onshore wind, swinging sideways-on to it...

...so I made a rudder-lift to let the blade stay attached but airborne until I've climbed in and am almost sailing. Not rocket-science, but I don't think the last owner had needed it - he'd always had someone else holding the boat while he attended to such details. Likewise the rig - releasing the genoa furling line & instantly setting/trimming the sail lets me move off the beach immediately, without even hoisting the main...which waits quietly out of the way on the boom overhead, in lazyjacks. (The eccentricity is all for a reason! )

I'm always surprised by sailors' readiness to land, put the boat on the trolley, haul-out and wander away to chat with other crews, leaving the sails pulling with the wind astern...

...probably I worry too much, but I've seen capsizes caused on shore that way so I like the sails not to be pulling by the time I climb out of the boat. Her size and the onshore wind make it impossible to leave her, nose to windward...and she's old and I'm older, and neither of us want her grinding self-destructively on the slipway as I fetch the wheels.

I'm tempted to find a little jib (Int 420?) to match the reefed mainsail in a blow. I s'pose I'll need a new bolt on the foredeck to bring the tack astern by about a foot.

 

[Kelpie]

I would very rarely, if ever, rig ashore when singlehanding the Wayfarer. Just possibly in a mild offshore breeze, and only if I had enough depth at the stern for the rudder.
What I usually do is row out to a nearby buoy, rig a slip from the bow to the cleat at the mast, and rig there with the boat lying just off the wind. I find this is a bit easier than being directly head to wind, and it gives me certainty about which tack I will set out on once I let go the slip line. On returning ashore, I just dot he reverse, sail up to the mooring, de-rig, row the last 50yds ashore.

I think this mentality came about because I started out crewing on bigger boats.
I don't know if an osprey is stable enough to do this, and if it isn't, well I wouldn't be going cruising in one.

 

[Ravi]

Dan,

I know what you mean about launching single handed. There are a few unfortunate photos of me tumbling into the boat and lying like a flipped turtle in the cockpit, with main flapping as I desperately try to get the rudder down before I drift back ashore!

If you want to check out the reefing (rather than furling) genoa, this is the link to the guy who makes them. http://www.flexible-reefing-spars.co.uk/about_us_history.htm
Many people make their own using the same design, which is pretty straightforward (and very cheap if you already have a furling drum).

For cruising, another thing to consider... masthead buoyancy. £££s from a chandler or a milk carton epoxied shut at the masthead.