hinch
Active member
most marina's have little tide books you can get from them for their specific tide times failing that i believe the national oceanographic institute publishes tide tables for all major ports/area's
My first boat - buying tomorrow fingers crossed (advice pls)
- Thread starter TonyBerkshire
- Start date
limecc
Active member
Functionally I think it's the best one but not free. It also shows strength and direction of currents for each port.
Alternatively there's a free app called simply 'Tides' which I like.
For river levels and to find the tide times for tidal parts use the government website and the nearest station on the stretch of water you are using.
Check for flooding
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Bigplumbs
Well-known member
If you get the Navionics App that will also do tides
Nito
Active member
This has turned out to be an excellent thread packed with useful info.
Looking where you live, there seem to be some excellent (and many) rivers. That little boat would appear to be quite versatile. The bow cover thing was an excellent idea also.
I use the navionics app too.
Looking where you live, there seem to be some excellent (and many) rivers. That little boat would appear to be quite versatile. The bow cover thing was an excellent idea also.
I use the navionics app too.
limecc
Active member
Only bitter pill is the £35/yr subscription. I'm torn whether to instead get a better plotter with the relief shading on the bottom contours.
Sticky Fingers
Well-known member
£35 a year for the Navionics app (iPhone or Android) is an absolute bargain. 100% recommended.
Hangie
Member
Smaller boats go straight to the beach, bigger ones use tenders.
Beaching the boat is not like parking a car due to tide. You will need adjust the anchor from time to time. Sometimes you can see peoples forget and wake up with the boat on the beach and unable to leave.
As for dry stack. This one was recommended here in the past: KB Boats | Packages & Prices
With all per meter prices please check the minimum charge. At the sea side some places will charge for minimum 7m or 6m. I would not expect less than 5m unless clarified as a tender addition to the main vessel.
limecc
Active member
Yes but this is why I purchased a second anchor (shiny stainless - woo) and the anchor buddy. Just motor up to the beach, hop off and deploy the second anchor, the anchor buddy pulls the boat back out into deeper water. No risk of being grounded as the tide retreats.
TonyBerkshire
Active member
?Hangie
Member
Never heard about anchor buddy
How I'm doing that is deploying my main anchor on deep water. I got windlass so to pul it up or down is very easy. For stability I got aft small anchor which I just move a bit once a while.
TonyBerkshire
Active member
Ha good tip... seen loads of boats in the past stranded when the tide goes out... need set an hourly alarm
then ... or use the anchor buddy as limecc suggested ?
. .. and yes saw the small print now ... there are minimum charge lengths. Thanks again.You got me thinking maybe later on need a main vessell and have smaller boats can lower down ... bit like titanic and the life boats... perhaps the wrong example but you know what I mean ?
TonyBerkshire
Active member
The link to anchor buddy vid
Hangie
Member
I was curious why it is so cheap and now I know why. It is drying pontoon. Half of the time your boat will be sitting on the ground and you wont be able to use it - hence the low price.
You got -3.5m on approach which is a lot - depending on the day it might be only 2h around high tide or so.
Found a photo to illustrate:
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limecc
Active member
Yes it dries but it's got a much bigger window than you suggest. We can launch our size boats at minimum LAT of 2.3m using Northney port as a reference. Therefore it's possible to get a good six, seven hours or more out on the sea. Options to moor temporarily at Sparkes Marina if something throws your timing off or go to Itchenor.
I posted photos of various tide states for the slip on Boatlaunch.
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Hangie
Member
For Hayling yacht company you got -3.5m chart datum. With boat min draft 0.4m I would say you need 4m of tide.
This is from today:
As you can see there was 4m of tide for 4h only so 2hr around high tide mark. I've also checked at today we are quite close spring tide so for most of the time it will be even worse than that.
Closer to neap it will be like that:
With -3.5m you would have maybe an hour in total to leave and come back
In a small boat when you are limited by weather I would prefer to avoid yet another variable to not miss that one or two weekends per year we got here
TonyBerkshire
Active member
I attend the school of youtube for an hour each night... and believe some sessions on tides and pontoons is in order... I've been googling and learning about all the terminology you guys have been using in this thread and thanks again... Great learning ?
limecc
Active member
For Hayling yacht company you got -3.5m chart datum. With boat min draft 0.4m I would say you need 4m of tide.
This is from today:
View attachment 128799
As you can see there was 4m of tide for 4h only so 2hr around high tide mark. I've also checked at today we are quite close spring tide so for most of the time it will be even worse than that.
Closer to neap it will be like that:
View attachment 128801
With -3.5m you would have maybe an hour in total to leave and come back
In a small boat when you are limited by weather I would prefer to avoid yet another variable to not miss that one or two weekends per year we got here
There's other all tide options like Northney Marina, Calshot or Eastney, but the former is expensive and the latter have strong currents and no pontoon.
My boat's got a minimum draft of 0.3m, I launched many times at 2.5m and once at 2.3m, please see photographic evidence I posted. When you are out of the Marina it gets deeper and deeper.
Today if I was going out (high tide is nearly 1m less than what it can be), I would be able to spend 7 hours out, maybe lapping the IoW. Photo below, the boat is being retrieved at 3.3m LAT.
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Hangie
Member
Yes of course there will be better and worse slipway which are available at different state of tide. My comment was for Hayling yacht company which got approach at massive -3.5m - hence a very short window and low price. If you were launching at 2.3m with draft of 0.3 there were 2.6m tide at least - Hayling yacht company approach would be still just mud then and become usable 1.4m later at 4m of water.
Northey marine slipway is good as approach is dredged (another key word for Tonny ?), but at least 2 years ago it was only available for "members" during summer weekends.
limecc
Active member
Sorry I don't follow. The 2.3m isn't plus my 0.3m draft, it's the actual state of tide. I found making an offset in my app too confusing. I used Northney as the nearest reference port, so 2.3m tide at Northney and I can launch at HYC.
Oh and Northney say it's members only, but if you rock up and it's not busy they're actually ok about using the ramp.
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Hangie
Member
Sorry wrong wording, was doing few things at the time. Point is if you were launching at 2.3m of tide and your boat need 0.3m that would mean charted datum for that slip is -2m in the ideal case.
For Hayling yacht company charts are saying -3.5m which means it still will be 1.5m above sea level at the same time as your slip.
Using you chart for -3.5m would give you 3h window roughly in total vs 7hr for -2m slip.
\As for Northey is exactly what I heard, you can use it when not busy. But show me a nice day in summery (even worse if it is weekend) when it wont be packed and you will be let in
