Budget for an autopilot (37-40ft boat)

Kelpie

Kelpie

Well-Known Member
Joined
15 May 2005
Messages
7,766
Location
Afloat
Visit site
Looking at centre cockpit boats up to 40ft, e.g. Westerly or Moody, most already have a below-decks autopilot fitted to the steering quadrant.
I know it will vary quite a bit in the case of boats that do not have a working autopilot, how much should I be budgeting to fit one? I'm happy to do most of the actual work myself, just a bit confused about what bits need to be bought and what it will add up to.
 
They're not cheap. Main choices seem to be Raymarine or Garmin/Jefa. (I'm thinking about getting a Jefa drive to go with my Raymarine electronics, but as I haven't done it yet I can't recommend that route personally.)

If you're replacing a non working autopilot then installation should be much cheaper than fitting one from scratch. Make sure whatever you buy will fit the existing mounts. If it works well installation should be pretty near zero if you're doing the work yourself.
 
As duncan says, if you do it yourself you should be able to get the whole lot for around £3K. Unless the boat has hydraulic steering, an electric linear drive is strong and reliable. You'll probably need to fit a tiller lever on the rudder post, Jefa is a good source for one of these.
 
Kelpie said:
I'm happy to do most of the actual work myself, just a bit confused about what bits need to be bought and what it will add up to.
Click to expand...

In terms of bits you need a linear drive to turn the rudder. Needs strong attachment points on hull and quadrant or alternative. Can be quite a bit of force involved so don't bodge (like the so called professional the original owner of my boat used). Hence post above about it being easier if you're replacing an existing one.

Electronics. Some form of control box (ACU in Raymarine-speak) which feeds power to the autopilot and activates the clutch). A rudder reference arm - maybe the most expensive variable resistor you'll ever buy.

A control head (with Raymarine this is P70 which works with the EV-1 sensor). EV-1 is more than just a compass - it has motion sensors (as do smartphones) and the logic to control the ACU.

Cheapest way is to buy them all as a pack, as the individual bits cost a lot more.
 
Agree with the jeffa route , if you go down the raymarine route I have installed the raymarine but did not buy the electric linear drive that went with it as the jeffa was cheaper and is the better choice and works well with the raymarine I had to go with no 2 auto pilot so it worked out about 600 pounds cheaper.
also got form cactus as they had a good deal on
 
Last edited:
Kelpie said:
Looking at centre cockpit boats up to 40ft, e.g. Westerly or Moody, most already have a below-decks autopilot fitted to the steering quadrant.
Click to expand...

I have no experience of mucking about with autopilots other than the raymarine/autohelm on my oceanlord but...

What I presume was the early 90s factory fit was control unit and st7001 head unit wired into the seatalk network, drive unit and rudder reference attached to the quadrant, fluxgate compass and associated ST50 compass display. I have a type 1 linear drive unit which is for boats up to 11000kg displacement. An oceanlord is at the top end of what a type 1 unit supports.

When I thought the control unit had failed (actually it hadn't but that's another story) I "upgraded". As has been stated, it's usual to buy the components in a "pack". With drive unit included this is a bit over £2.5k. Without the drive unit it's about £1k. The type 2 drive unit which will steer boats of heavier displacement and the acu-400 which will control that will push the price up to £4k. That's why I stuck with my type 1 and the cheaper control unit.

As folks have mentioned, much depends on what you have at the moment (albeit non-working). I don't believe the drive units or rudder reference units have changed in 25+ years so if you have one component which has failed you might not have to replace everything. If it's the drive unit it might be fixable. Places like The Service Centre won't repair old control units. I'm using my original drive unit and rudder reference with the new control unit and gyro compass.

If you're starting from scratch, if going the raymarine route you'd buy a pack like this:
https://hudsonmarine.co.uk/products/raymarine-evolution-ev-200-linear-autopilot-with-type-1-linear-drive-and-p70s-control-t70158

You don't save much by buying the drive inclusive, but I have no experience of the other drive units folks here are advocating.

This gives you:
* A control unit: the computer which controls everything
* A type 1 linear drive unit to connect to the quadrant, controlled by the control unit
* A rudder reference unit, connected to the quadrant and to the control unit to give it rudder angle info (this isn't pictured in the publicity, but you get one in the box)
* The ev1 compass/gyro thingy which connects to the control unit via nmea 2000/seatalkng
* A head unit (display control thingy which can conveniently also display any other networked boat data)
* Enough bits to start a very basic seatalkng network

On a 25+ year old westerly/moody autohelm/raymarine-equiped you probably have older seatalk instruments. You can feed seatalk 1 into the control head as I undertand it but that's not the route I went down. Instead I embraced seatalkng. Fortunately my AIS and plotter already supported that so adding it in was easy. I just bought a couple more drop cables, a longer backbone and added in a seatalk 1 to seatalk ng adapter to hook up my ST50 instruments (maybe budget a couple of hundred for networking). If you want to use your pilot's sail to wind or go to waypoint options you'll need to have it networked and feed it data from your wind transducer and GPS.
 
Last edited:
It must be noted were and what you want the drive to do and if your boat is at the top end off the scale recommended by the manufacture , then you need to decide what your sailing will be, if your planning offshore sailing or coastal , Ocean sailing I would always ere on the side of over engineering, as your auto pilot drive will be put under a heavier strain ,
 
lpdsn said:
They're not cheap. Main choices seem to be Raymarine or Garmin/Jefa. (I'm thinking about getting a Jefa drive to go with my Raymarine electronics, but as I haven't done it yet I can't recommend that route personally.)

If you're replacing a non working autopilot then installation should be much cheaper than fitting one from scratch. Make sure whatever you buy will fit the existing mounts. If it works well installation should be pretty near zero if you're doing the work yourself.
Click to expand...
We have Raymarine EV200 and Jefa LD100 a perfect combo.
I like the clutch that keep the lock after AP is turned off until the wheel is moved.
 
moomba said:
It must be noted were and what you want the drive to do and if your boat is at the top end off the scale recommended by the manufacture , then you need to decide what your sailing will be, if your planning offshore sailing or coastal , Ocean sailing I would always ere on the side of over engineering, as your auto pilot drive will be put under a heavier strain ,
Click to expand...

Some sense in this.
Also what do you expect the drive to be able to cope with?
There is a very big difference between saling in gentle swell and powering downwind. When you get to the serious end, prices will shoot up.

Another factor, it's not the weight of the boat which matters so much as the power required to steer it. A heavy boat with a deep balanced rudder may get by with a low power drive, when a smaller boat with a crude unbalanced rudder will not.

I was a little involved with putting a serious autopilot on a racing boat. IIRC the bill for structural work was in 4 figures, you need something strong to connect the other end of the ram to.
 
So as I thought, it's a bit complicated!
The plan is to equip a boat for bluewater cruising, but there would be a Hydrovane or similar doing most of the ocean stuff. The autopilot would be primarily for use when motoring, or for short periods when it wasn't worth setting up the windvane. Obviously it would be a good idea to have something robust enough to act as a backup to the vane, though.
The boats we're currently considering include the Moody 37/376, Westerly Sealord/Oceanlord, and others of that sort of type.

At the moment we really just need a rough figure so that we can factor in the cost of an autopilot when making an offer on a boat. Looks like £2.5-3k should be about right, from what's been suggested above.
 
laika said:
If you want to use your pilot's sail to wind or go to waypoint options you'll need to have it networked and feed it data from your wind transducer and GPS.
Click to expand...

It's worth noting that these features don't always work if you have a mix of makes of equipment. If you really want your autopilot to follow a course on your plotter, it might be best to get one which is the same make as your plotter.
 
Kelpie said:
So as I thought, it's a bit complicated!
The plan is to equip a boat for bluewater cruising, but there would be a Hydrovane or similar doing most of the ocean stuff. The autopilot would be primarily for use when motoring, or for short periods when it wasn't worth setting up the windvane. Obviously it would be a good idea to have something robust enough to act as a backup to the vane, though.
The boats we're currently considering include the Moody 37/376, Westerly Sealord/Oceanlord, and others of that sort of type.

At the moment we really just need a rough figure so that we can factor in the cost of an autopilot when making an offer on a boat. Looks like £2.5-3k should be about right, from what's been suggested above.
Click to expand...


It will be very unusual for that type of boat not to be fitted with an autopilot, although of course it may well be in the need to replace category because of age.

You will almost certainly have to consider the point pvb raises - that is what do you want it to do and how does it relate to your other electronics. The latest autopilots are streets ahead of the older ones in functionality and you may wish to take advantage of that anyway, particularly if you are replacing the other instruments.

The good thing is that although still a lot of money the basic price has not changed for many years despite the technical improvements. You may well find you can reuse the drive and just change the course computer and control head.
 
What's prompted me to ask the question is that a boat I'm trying to arrange to view (if the broker ever decides to return my calls/emails) does not have an autopilot, so I need to factor the cost of adding one to the budget and potential offer. I agree that most boats do seem to have one fitted, although in some cases it is just a wheelpilot which I understand to be inferior.

In terms of functionality, I like the sound of the latest gizmos which use accelerometers as well as a compass, but I'm not sure I see the point in being able to program a course from the plotter. My tillerpilot has this function and I've never used it. But each to their own.
 
Kelpie said:
What's prompted me to ask the question is that a boat I'm trying to arrange to view (if the broker ever decides to return my calls/emails) does not have an autopilot, so I need to factor the cost of adding one to the budget and potential offer. I agree that most boats do seem to have one fitted, although in some cases it is just a wheelpilot which I understand to be inferior.

In terms of functionality, I like the sound of the latest gizmos which use accelerometers as well as a compass, but I'm not sure I see the point in being able to program a course from the plotter. My tillerpilot has this function and I've never used it. But each to their own.
Click to expand...

Unlikely boats bigger than 35' will have wheel pilots - but you are right most unsatisfactory bit of kit.

The thing with all the extra functions is that at first you tend to ignore them and carry on with your old strategy. Then you start to play and find some are actually very useful for you. Not all, and not all the same as other people. I have used the go to waypoint and particularly the steer to wind and the associated tacking function both of which suit the sort of sailing I do.

The main thing though is that generally the newer types steer a better course, particularly downwind. All the other integrated bits come as a bonus to use if you find them useful. However if I had a functioning existing autopilot and was relying on mostly a vane, I don't think an upgrade would be high on my list.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Other threads that may be of interest

Frogmogman
My next boat.
2 3
Replies
40
Views
1K
fredrussell
F
R
My boat trip hopefully in May Around Scotland
2 3 4
Replies
65
Views
2K
RobBradley
R

Share this page

Top