How big is your chart table?

VO5, I've lost all my interest in designing/rebuilding/restyling my own boat, in the last ninety seconds. Can I come and be a chirpy chappie on your boat, and may I later have some of SWMBO's salami sandwiches? I'll wear my porkpie hat, and call everyone 'sir'.

It sounds...(what's the phrase, indicative of enthusiasm in the youth of today?)...AWESOME! :)
 
dancrane said:
VO5, I've lost all my interest in designing/rebuilding/restyling my own boat, in the last ninety seconds. Can I come and be a chirpy chappie on your boat, and may I later have some of SWMBO's salami sandwiches? I'll wear my porkpie hat, and call everyone 'sir'.

It sounds...(what's the phrase, indicative of enthusiasm in the youth of today?)...AWESOME! :)
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Yes by all means.
I consider that youngsters have to be enthused and encouraged to take an interest, otherwise they get bored and get up to mischief.
When I was a boy, and brought up here, the Royal Navy, (just sfter WW2) was very active and the harbour was constanly busy with the toing and froing of warships.
My dad was a civilian at the Admiralty and I had, like a lot of boys of my generation, opportunities to visit frigates, destroyers, tugs, aircraft carriers, etc.,
These experiences for me were formative because they were full of wonder at all the piping, tannoy messages, signals, and all the hustle and bustle of warships in port.
Invairably I belonged to a group of little boys who were invited aboard and shown round and had things explained to us.
The Engine Room, The Bridge, all the Gunnery, Torpedoes, the lot, and then lunch in the Petty Officers Mess, formica tops and pressed steel dishes, huge mugs of tea or coca cola.
I can tell you that out of our crowd no less than four of us grew up and went to sea professionally as Engineers or deck officers.
That atmosphere nowadays is missing because the RN has shrunk to a ghost of its former size.
This is a port.
This stimulus is missing for today's youngsters.
I remember not sleeping with excitement at the idea of the following day being invited as a school outing for a ride in a harbour tug, for example.
I am interested in giving an opportunity to youngsters to experience being afloat.
So on board I have for example a striking clock making the bells for watches and the VHF is kept on for the young visitors to hear. Also they make signals using the international code so the others ashore can decipher their messages.
If we go out into the bay, they keep 1/2 hour watches and take it in turn to steer, repeat helm orders as they are given, use the winches and keep lookouts with binoculars etc.,
They are all given titles ; yeoman, quartermaster, bugler, lookout etc.,the youngest one is always "Snotty"....LOL.
I always take an experienced hand to help and supervise.
I tell them it is a ship and they are sailing it.
They all dress in white.
Its fantastic. And the parents are very pleased.
Next year they will be getting lessons ashore, simple chartwork, knots, that sort of thing. Ages 7 to 15, 8 at a time. Then teatime, marvellous.:D
 
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It sounds blissful. The thought takes me back to austere but cheery b&w images of Trevor Howard and Johnnie Mills, and possibly a badly-behaved Dickie Attenborough, playing the spritely, mischievous youth.

My dad was a matlo (matlow? matloe?) between '45 and '48, and even now, I hear so much from him about the three years after the war when he went round the world at HM's expense, that I know those days of service must have been engrained pretty deeply on all those involved, however young.

What you're doing is wonderfully real and useful, and must be so memorable and constructive for the kids.

I can't think when I last heard of something that made me wish I was still thirteen...

...good luck to you and your crews. I'd happily come along and be Snotty, with greatest pleasure. :)
 
I will tell you what is an enormous reward..
Because they get excited and all ask questions at once and then I give detailed explanations very patiently....

It is enormously gratifying to hear them repeat what they have learnt to bemused grownups.

This little boy of nine gave a very accurate account to his uncle of the different sounds an anchor cable makes when it is brought in and let out, and all about the anchor ball and the anchor a'cockabill and how many shackles in the water and so on...

And the other little fellow telling his mother all about what the pilot does, and the pilot ladder and flags H and G and what they mean...and so on...all told in excited little voices....

Marvellous...:D
 
Our mass produced Bavaria 38 AWB has a dedicated chart table with it's own seat. It is 94 cm's by 60 cms. It has storage underneath for charts (not the deepest) in addition two largish cupboards above and to the right. I store pilot books and charts in one and items such as handheld gps, radio, binnoculars, torches etc in the other. In addition underneath the chart table there is another cupboard, but I have nothing left to do with navigation to put in there so used for lifejackets, etc.
This is an interesting post but it does not help to make it about the alleged shortcomings of mass produced awb's. I am aware of alteast one 'quality' yacht costing more than twice mine that does not have a chart table at all.
I do find the chart table is most useful in using the computer, working on fiddly items (parts of which I do not want to lose!) and storing things that do not seem to want to live anywhere else. I tend to use the saloon or cockpit table if I want to fully open a chart, which I seldom find necessary
 
Fred drift

[QUOTE=VO5
"I will tell you what is an enormous reward."

Taking a bunch of teenagers on a 70ft narrowboat and producing two competent steerers by the end of the week. Three years later they knock at the front door, with girlfriends, to report on their own canal holiday.
 
charts vs plotters

PeteCooper said:
Why do you need a chart table when everybody has plotters nowadays?
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An electronic device displaying 'charts' is not a LEGAL chart, only an aid to navigation. You may not be an IMO COLREGS 300 ton ship (i'm 4 and 16/100 TM) but in any court (say you barge through a TSS the wrong way) you need to show planned route and track, only the paper version is legal.
Does anyone know if you can still get the 'yeoman' plotter that link GPS to paper charts?
 
rogerhudson said:
An electronic device displaying 'charts' is not a LEGAL chart, only an aid to navigation. You may not be an IMO COLREGS 300 ton ship (i'm 4 and 16/100 TM) but in any court (say you barge through a TSS the wrong way) you need to show planned route and track, only the paper version is legal.
Does anyone know if you can still get the 'yeoman' plotter that link GPS to paper charts?
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So what do x channel ferries use then :rolleyes:
 
chart table angle

parsifal said:
Mine is 39" wide by a little less depth. That is in a 28-foot yacht. It doesn't seem out of place and it is a very useful feature.

In port it doubles as a sideboard and general dumping ground. Below the lifting lid is a space for stowing charts, about 6" deep, and beneath that is a trotter-box and a locker containing spare parts and tools that aren't often needed, e.g. prop-puller, rig tension gauge, caulking gun, mallet, epoxy kit, etc
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I have seen some chart tables that slope like old school/clerks desks, then the mate/cook can't use it for those other table like jobs. Get a plastic ('talc' in old military parlance) cover, clip over and mark two vertical crosses to 'fix' the plastic and use v.thin felt tips. Marking a cart (say of the Fal estury) on the paper for the twentieth time is a bit silly.
 
dancrane said:
Silly question, this. I don't have an Admiralty chart to hand, and I'm redrawing my cabin layout (entirely speculatively); I've always dreamed of a chart table big enough not to have to work on a chart that's folded, but I can't remember the exact dimensions, and I can't find them listed anywhere.

Anybody got a full-size chart, and a tape-measure?

On the subject, is anybody wretchedly frustrated, or entirely content, working on a chart-table the size of a tea-tray? So much navigation today seems to be done without paper, I feel elderly just asking. Am I alone? :rolleyes:
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I have a couple of proper Admiralty ones to hand, and they are 40" x 32" approx. They are very slightly different, but one's a routing chart. Also have a US chart that is 48" x 36".
 
rogerhudson said:
An electronic device displaying 'charts' is not a LEGAL chart, only an aid to navigation. You may not be an IMO COLREGS 300 ton ship (i'm 4 and 16/100 TM) but in any court (say you barge through a TSS the wrong way) you need to show planned route and track, only the paper version is legal.
Does anyone know if you can still get the 'yeoman' plotter that link GPS to paper charts?
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You most certainly can. I had the MD on board Full Circle yesterday, and he has my Yeoman for service now.

http://www.precisionnavigation.co.uk/products.html?page=shop.browse&category_id=1

I have had Yeoman since around 1991 when mine was fired up by Dinghy Decca D.
 
rogerhudson said:
I have seen some chart tables that slope like old school/clerks desks, then the mate/cook can't use it for those other table like jobs.
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Why would I object to the chart table being used for other purposes when in port? It's a chart table - not an altar.


rogerhudson said:
Marking a cart (say of the Fal estury) on the paper for the twentieth time is a bit silly.
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It certainly is. Estuaries usually find me in the cockpit - not plotting at a chart table. And, had I been there twenty times, I reckon I would know it well enough to be able to dispense with plotting on a chart.
 
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prv said:
I've seen pictures of a self-built yacht which had a huge chart-board probably 3 foot by 4 or 5 that hinged down from the deckhead. The hinges were along the top of the cabin side; when the thing was hoisted it was above head height and unobtrusive, when lowered it hung down slightly below 45º, supported on the joinery below. It had a big fiddle along the bottom but charts etc were mostly held in place with big spring-clips round the edges. Obviously you couldn't leave pilot books etc lying on it while you popped out on deck, but the owner said he preferred to work at charts standing up rather than hunched over a table. Preventing people leaving junk all over the chart was also a design goal :)

Worked quite well in his boat, but that has an unusual interior layout and a boxy flat-topped coachroof. Wouldn't go so well in something curved and fibreglass.

Pete
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I have a photo of the folkboat 'Jester' where the late great Mike Richey had a full sized chart table in the centre of the cabin, facing forwards,but that is for when navigation is the heart and sole of the sailing activity.
 
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