Should I other with masthead nav lights?

Rivers & creeks

Rivers & creeks

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Just taken the mast down on Muddy Paws and the masthead tricolour unit fell apart. We have a good stern light, a powerful LED anchor light and nav lights on the bows. Should we replace the masthead light? I have heard they are harder to see than ones on the bow and I thought I might beef those up instead. Muddy Paws is a Heavenly Twins 27 (catamaran).

Thanks for your views.
 
Also, I would guess that in bumpy weather the deck level nav lights will spend a certain amount of time shielded from view by waves.
 
We spent a night to remember that should best be forgotten surfing down huge seas in company with another W33 when we had one a while back. We had a tricolour light on which he could see most of the time, he had only deck level nav lights on which we couldn't see except on the few occasions we were both on a wavecrest at the same time. We were half a mile apart and the visibility was otherwise excellent. At the same time we were consuming around 2A to his 6A every hour.
 
The tricolour is well out of your own field of vision and does not shine on bits of superstucture, stanchions or guard rails. Even if you have a bicolour mounted in front of all that you don't get any glare back from rain, drizzle, mist, fog or snow.
 
Is it not true that large ships have trouble, in the Solent, seeing tricolours because of their position against the shore lights?
Sure I read that somewhere
 
Years ago i had a tricolour light that had a 225mm long flourescent tube in it. ( I forget the manufacturer) The real handy thing was that it had a drain hole in the bottom ( I assume that is what it was) 7& the light shone through the hole like a small beam. The beam lit up the front edge of the sail for about half way down. It made sail trimming miles easier & I have often considered getting a tricolour, fitting it on a bracket just aft of the masthead & deliberately drilling a hole in the bottom.

One point about tricolours is that off Ostend a couple of times now I have come very close to other yachts at night. As I did not expect to see other yachts at the time & as I was single handing so a bit lax with the observations I did not look up so I missed the lights & very nearly collided. If one is close & not stargazing it is very easy to do. In the Solent i assume there are always yachts about so one keeps a really good lookout. I admit I was at fault but oddly enough the other yachts did not see my lights at deck level either
 
Yes, but no sailing thing with an engine should have only a tri-colour in her arsenal.

We use low level for land fall, but always switch over to masthead on passage for reasons given above.

To the original question, yes, yes, yes, at the very least it is a good back up to have two sets of nav lights. The boat next door to me has had a blown masthead for two seasons now, he has been promising to change the bulb for months!

When he does venture out at night he has to tape those battery powered emergency lights to his shrouds, whereas I have to press a switch if a bulb blows in our set up.
 
As stated it cant hurt to have backups. Even if they are hard to see against shore lights, that is only when you're near the shore!!!!!

Lalizas do a combi tricolour/anchor at round £70 and if your budget will stand it, it is a useful piece of kit.

Just remember you can only legally use the tricolour when sailing. Under motor you need your normal nav lights plus steaming.

Otherwise, you pays your money etc.....

Chas
 
If and when a LED tricolour becomes available, I will be one of the first in the queue. Apart from the leds ability to last eons longer than a tungsten filament, as there are good few in a an array,the loss of one LED will make very little difference, and will mean never having to change the bulb...
Roll on!
 
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