Hydrovane and Sadler 32

[Finbar]

I picked up a second hand Windpilot and fitted it to my Sadler 32 some years and one boat ago. I removed the stern ladder and converted it to hook on over the midship toe rail in order to fit the Windpilot. It was a neat arrangement, and the Windpilot worked well on long passages. As an added benefit it was found much easier and safer to board the dinghy midship. As I singlehanded sometimes, I mounted a pull down safety ladder at the stern for security.
If you are coast hopping, the Windpilot is less useful as you have to adjust for every windshift, and soon get tired of fidgeting. The trusty Autohelm 2000 was far superior!
Hope this is useful,

 

[H35]

The trusty Autohelm 2000 was far superior!

Not to be mistaken for the Raymarine ST2000, which I have. Only usable in calme weather, while motoring...
-In general, you need one heck of an advanced autopilot to handle a boat under sail in heavy weather.

 

[vyv_cox]

I picked up a second hand Windpilot and fitted it to my Sadler 32 some years and one boat ago. I removed the stern ladder and converted it to hook on over the midship toe rail in order to fit the Windpilot. It was a neat arrangement, and the Windpilot worked well on long passages. As an added benefit it was found much easier and safer to board the dinghy midship. As I singlehanded sometimes, I mounted a pull down safety ladder at the stern for security.
If you are coast hopping, the Windpilot is less useful as you have to adjust for every windshift, and soon get tired of fidgeting. The trusty Autohelm 2000 was far superior!
Hope this is useful,

Mirrors my experience, apart from the ladder location. We mainly used ours in coastal passages in Holland, where it was excellent in on-shore winds but mostly too shifty in offshore ones. Once we arrived in the Med we rarely found steady winds, so it became less useful and we sold it. Where it was superb was in its use of the oar in waves, where it could 'predict' a course change as each wave caused the boat to yaw. In quarter-wave conditions it steered a better course than either of us could.

 

[macd]

In quarter-wave conditions it steered a better course than either of us could.

+1
I had one on my last boat. I used to stand at the stern and just watch it, mesmerised by its subtlety.

 

[Daydream believer]

Not to be mistaken for the Raymarine ST2000, which I have. Only usable in calme weather, while motoring...
-In general, you need one heck of an advanced autopilot to handle a boat under sail in heavy weather.

I tend to agree with this. I find the raymarine 2000 ( third one) stays on board as a spare & the AV100 gets used for motoring or light airs.
I use the Aeries as much as I can & i sail single handed in Thames estuary & coastal to places such as Channel islands & to Brest. Aeries is great & does not need loads of adjustment, so I disagree with Vyv. I follow the wind changes & quite often the boat will go back on course after a few minutes. Some autopilots are wind controlled so would suffer the same issue. If they are not then they are no use up wind.
In heavy weather the Raymarine is often useless.
My only grouse is that my lift up version is heavy. But it does have the advantage that it can be removed in a few minutes for racing.

 

[H35]

I'm ambivalent to Hydrovane. First of all it's expensive, even used. Second, it is obviously not as strong as other vanes. Some says it's to weak. Some says it handles their 15 ton boat with ease. What to think of it? Well, my boat with its slim lines weighs in at 4 tons with all the gear onboard, and it's well balanced indeed.
But... I can put a Hydrovane straight through my platform, and keep it. Where as all other vanes will prey on it and have it removed. What to do. What to do...

 

[ibbo]

I've now had a years worth of use out of my Sea Feather wind vane. I can't claim it's perfect as in light wind it's not always up to the job. Usually ok to windward, but down wind not so hot.
A quartering sea, with a bit of wind is no problem.
I use it regularily locally and find it very useful. You do have to take care near the shore, as a back eddy from the hilltop will have you heading for the shallows.
It does fit nicely on a narrow transom, and isn't too heavy, which is a major concern for those with smaller boats. I also like the adjustable mounting. Your ladder would need to be moved but it would probably fit on the platform.
Mike

 

[H35]

I rather wouldn't have it mounted ON the platform, as it may not be strong enough. The ladder is a must, and since none of the steps fold in under the platform, the stem of a Hydrovane can go straight through. Any other wind vane have sideways movement that makes this impossible.

 

[Daydream believer]

I rather wouldn't have it mounted ON the platform, as it may not be strong enough. The ladder is a must, and since none of the steps fold in under the platform, the stem of a Hydrovane can go straight through. Any other wind vane have sideways movement that makes this impossible.

Actually the sideways movement at the level of the platform is not very great. You would find that at that level there would probably be about 200mm total at the most so a small slot would be sufficient.
there might also be a couple of holes for the steering rope arms with the Aeries but a design with arms at the top would avoid that

The latest Sailomat would fit much better with only a small hole in the platform. Much bigger than a Hydrovane but I feel you would get better performance on a small yacht with an oar type unit than the Hydrovane due to the small boat bouncing around more.

 

[KellysEye]

>Wandering Star
Time & again you make this statement as fact but what evidence can you produce to back up the claim? I would claim servo pendulum models of windvane steering gears to be far in excess of vertical axis models. In particular I'd claim Aries and Monitor models individually number far in excess of Hydrovanes.

The claim is fact, it is what I have seen in the 2004 ARC and the years spent in the Caribbean where I saw 2,000+ boats including 700 ARC boats. Are you basing you basing your claim or what you have seen in places like the Caribbean or what you have made up or something else?

>Tranona
He is well known on here for making unsubstantiated or untrue claims, despite being corrected each time he does it. He never has any evidence - seems that him just saying it makes it true!

Best to ignore.

Time & again you make this statement as fact but what evidence can you produce to back up the claim?

See above you are being your normal wrong and offensive self as usual.

>Vyv Cox

I recall that YM carried out a survey of wind steering systems used by ARC sailors, something like 10 years ago. I know that Windpilot was the most numerous in that survey, noted because I had one at that time.

Interesting, the ARC survey in 2004 had Hydrovanes as the most common windvane, I saw the survey results after we did it.

>H35

It leaves me wondering then, WHO had Hydrovanes??

British boats.

 

[Wandering Star]

The claim is fact, it is what I have seen in the 2004 ARC and the years spent in the Caribbean where I saw 2,000+ boats including 700 ARC boats. Are you basing you basing your claim or what you have seen in places like the Caribbean or what you have made up or something else?

The claim is NOT fact. It's your assertion following your personal observations, it's NOT fact. My observations lead me to believe Hydrovanes are massively outnumbered both on a generic servo pendulum system basis and also outnumbered by Aries, Monitor, Windpilot, Fleming on an individual model basis, though I'm not claiming my observations to be FACT- as you are!

To suggest I'm basing my observations on hearsay or whatever is slightly insulting, I've personally Transatted and cruised the Caribbean or EC Florida 8 times plus done a couple of Transmeds too, on my own beaten up boats!

 

[KellysEye]

>The claim is NOT fact. It's your assertion following your personal observations, it's NOT fact. My observations lead me to believe Hydrovanes are massively outnumbered both on a generic servo pendulum system basis and also outnumbered by Aries, Monitor, Windpilot, Fleming on an individual model basis, though I'm not claiming my observations to be FACT- as you are!
To suggest I'm basing my observations on hearsay or whatever is slightly insulting, I've personally Transatted and cruised the Caribbean or EC Florida 8 times plus done a couple of Transmeds too, on my own beaten up boats!

If you don't believe what I observed why should I believe what you observed.

 

[macd]

If you want your "facts" to be taken more seriously, Kelly, perhaps you should reconsider your yen for gross and palpably false exaggeration. "Frenchmen always anchor over my hook", that sort of thing.

Taking a leaf from the same book, I will not allege that you always write hogwash.

Another thing that reduces your credibility, having posted over 10,000 times, is still not having got the hang of the 'Reply With Quote' facility. That really takes a special inattention to detail.

 

[Tranona]

>Tranona
He is well known on here for making unsubstantiated or untrue claims, despite being corrected each time he does it. He never has any evidence - seems that him just saying it makes it true!

Best to ignore.

Time & again you make this statement as fact but what evidence can you produce to back up the claim?

See above you are being your normal wrong and offensive self as usual.

British boats.

Sorry you find it offensive - just as I and others find your untrue posts offensive, particularly when you repeat them even after being shown conclusively that you are wrong.

By all means express your opinion about the Hydrovane as you and many others clearly get good service out of them - but there is plenty of evidence that there are more popular devices in use.

You seem to suffer from the same blindness that other opinionated people do - that is only seeing what you want to see and ignoring what does not fit your perceptions. Then you turn your partial observations into "facts". Constantly repeating them does not make your opinions facts.

Please, please as macd suggests and I have suggested in the past use the reply facility on this forum. You are the only one that uses the out of date method and it is so irritating trying to decipher what you are trying to say.

 

[H35]

Please, please as macd suggests and I have suggested in the past use the reply facility on this forum. You are the only one that uses the out of date method and it is so irritating trying to decipher what you are trying to say.

Look here, KellysEye. I'm using the "Reply with quote" function, and I have deleted part of Tranonas post which doesn't concern my point. Now you try it...

 

[macd]

Look here, KellysEye. I'm using the "Reply with quote" function, and I have deleted part of Tranonas post which doesn't concern my point. Now you try it...

If only more would do the same, rather than lob in the entire post and clog the screen (not to mention my sometimes tiny bandwidth). :encouragement:

Ref my earlier suggestion, it also implies (to me, at any rate), somewhat careless thinking, especially when it leaves you guessing which point they're trying to address.

 

[KellysEye]

I was going to ignore the latest offensive posts but I'll have one last go. One of the Frenchman who anchored front of was in English Harbour, Antigua We had been there many times when chartering and there are many areas where it is sandy but under it is dead coral so the anchor won't set. We tried to anchor and it wouldn't set so we moved back and it set. That afternoon a Frenchman dropped his anchor where ours didn't set and made no effort to dig it in. From then on one of us was on watch. The day after they went ashore just before dark and at 20.15 the wind had picked up and their boat began to drag. I went to the bows to stop the stern hitting our bows and pushed it away then Jane and I pushed it to keep it form hitting our hull. It anchored itself about 70 yards downwind. We had exactly the same thing happen in Norman Island BVI's.

At one point I was thing of suing those who been abusive with slander but I don't know who you are. I would won the cases because Jane witnessed everything posted from wind vanes to most reliable engines to French boats etc. So please grow up and stop behaving like spoilt children.

 

[macd]

At one point I was thing of suing those who been abusive with slander but I don't know who you are.

All you have to do is PM me, sunshine.

But before you go to any expense, look up 'slander'.

 

[Wandering Star]

At one point I was thing of suing those who been abusive with slander but I don't know who you are. I would won the cases because Jane witnessed everything posted from wind vanes to most reliable engines to French boats etc. So please grow up and stop behaving like spoilt children.

Ha Ha Ha, would agree someone is behaving like a spoiled child. You go ahead and sue us and provide your firm evidence to the Judge that there are more Hydrovanes being used by long distance sailors than any other type and our that disbelief in your statement is tantamount to slander, and see how much he awards you on the basis of your observations alone. As I clearly stated, this isn't about slagging off Hydrovanes which do a job (I've used one), its about you claiming Hydrovanes are more popular and more abundant than other types of windvane steering systems globally, not just amongst ARC participants, a statement which I strongly disagree with but also one which I don't actually care about.

Cheers, Brian.

 

[Tranona]

At one point I was thing of suing those who been abusive with slander but I don't know who you are. I would won the cases because Jane witnessed everything posted from wind vanes to most reliable engines to French boats etc. So please grow up and stop behaving like spoilt children.

Before you get even more steamed up, remember you are talking about your OPINIONS with the only supporting evidence being your observations ar reports from unnamed third parties.

You should expect to be challenged on this as you NEVER have any systematic verifiable evidence to support your assertions. That is what people object to - not your observations per se, but the refusal on your part to accept that your "evidence" is insufficient.

So, if you said in relation to windvane gear something like " On my travels I noticed that the Hydovane was popular on British boats and owners seem satisfied" then nobody could object, and would probably appreciate knowing that.

The flaws in what you actually say are that

British boats are probably a minority of boats ocean sailing

Your observations are several years old and only cover a limited area

The Hydrovane has limitations and there are many other designs and makes of gear that are more suitable for some boats

There have been well researched surveys (referred to by others here) that tell a very different story

One can say the same about you claims for engines. The two major manufacturers share the market, with perhaps Volvo currently having a slightly bigger share of new boats. Charter operators often prefer to keep to one brand. Some choose Volvo, some Yanmar and others not particularly bothered and take what comes with the boat - or don't have the clout to specify engines.

If one brand was inherently "better" then the other would not exist, or at least not gain 50% of the market. Just because you find one mechanic, or even fleet owner who claims Yanmar is better does not make it true - it is just an opinion. You could then talk to another operator who says exactly the same about the hundreds of Volvo engines on his fleet.

Apart from warning about passing opinion off as fact, it is also worth making the point about generalising from a specific. That is taking a limited range of observations (in your case often only one) and claiming that they represent the whole.