swinging mount for small radar

[wpsalm]

Have recently bought a small radar 16 mile furuno...plan to install it on the forward side of my mast ...thinking about some sort of swinging mount to help keep the dome level..my concerns are that the constant swinging may eventually cause some of the small wires in the cable to break any ideas on this and how to get around it ? would be appreciated ...the radar is a furuno 1720

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[pvb]

Probably not worth it. Heeling only affects sideways radar vision - ahead and astern are unaffected. Remember also that the scanner has a vertical beam width of around 25degrees, so you'd need to be heeled quite a bit before you lose sideways vision.

There are swivelling mast mounts around, but they're expensive. Questus is well-regarded, but at around $1100 it should be! Making your own is feasible, but you'd need to incorporate some sort of damping arrangement. The scanner cable probably would suffer from fatigue, too, leading to wires breaking, as you suspected.

An easier solution would be to mount the scanner on a pole at the stern and have a simple adjustable platform which you could tilt during long sails on a constant tack.

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[Alex_Blackwood]

Quite agree. I think it would be more trouble than it is worth. Perhaps such devices are available for small craft but I have never seen such a thing fitted except for gyro stabalised Naval weapons systems. Even then you get problems - just another thing to wrong. I would certainaly not bother for a navigational radar.

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[Guest]

Verical and Horizontal beam width ..

really make this sort of apparatus not worth the bother .......

You will be complicating a valuable piece of kit unnecessarily.

The range of the average yacht radar also really indicates that such measures are not really necessary.

I read somewhere in a 'so-called' experts book ...... that stabilised radar scanners were common on Merchant Ships ....... well burst my bubble - but I spent 17yrs on ships and never saw a stabilised platform for a radar !!!! They were all fixed mount jobs and never seemed to mind the rolling / pitching and general crap dished out day after day !!!

That reminds me if you ever replace a bit from your radar .... don't do what the average Sparks did on ships .... kept old magnetrons etc. and marked them - Used but Good -------- what the hell is that ??? It's new or crap !!!!


<hr width=100% size=1>Nigel ...
Bilge Keelers get up further ! I only came - cos they said there was FREE Guinness !

 

[Guest]

Post deleted by danfoley

 

[johnsomerhausen]

Re: Verical and Horizontal beam width ..

The vertical beam width of a Furuno is 25 degrees (12.5 above and 12.5 below the horizontal). If your boat is heeled 15 degres (which isn't all that much for, say, the Contessa 32, considered a reference standard for offshore boats), the loweer part of your beam will be above the horizon. The problem with gimballing the radar is the wear on the cable; Nick Nicholson, the former editor of Practical Sailor (a "Which"-like magazoine for US sailboat owners) had one on his boat when he did a circumnavigation and by the time he'd reached NZ, he had to replace the cable. I have my scanner on a pole at the stern, with a platform I can "heel" to compensate for the boat's heeling angle (a drawing appeared some 2-3 years back in PBO). The advantage of a low scanner position is that it can see targets quite close by (mighty useful for navigating a channel in dense fog) whilst maybe sacrificing some ranbe. The only real drawback is its inabilityu to see small buoys in 8 ft seas since it's only 10 ft above the water.
john

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[Alex_Blackwood]

Re: Verical and Horizontal beam width ..

39 years on ships and never saw anything but a radar scanner unit bolted firmly to the deck. ( Except the one that nearly fell off!).
You must have sailed with the same people I did! The "Used but Servicable" crowd, both "sparks" and "leckies". Did you ever come across the other guys who would take all the spare gear out of the original packing and restow it all. Then pay off before they could update the location sheets! Really helpful in the middle the night when you break down in a force 8.

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[Oldhand]

WIth reference to the responses, I don't think a "swinging" (or gimballed) mount is necessary but if you frequently sail with an exceess of 20 degrees heel, an "adjustable" mount would be an advantage.

I had such a mount pole mounted installation on the stern on a previous boat which had 3 positions, -15, 0 +15 degrees, selectable manully by a simple handle with a pin and hole locking system. If the mount is too high to reach a handle, a continuous pulley line system could be utilised with suitable end stops but the 0 position would have to be achived by cleating off at a marked position.

Hope this helps.

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[wpsalm]

Thanks for all the response....think some sort of self leveling mount is important as my new secondhand radar has an alarm and draws so little power that I could easilly leave it on for hours. guess the ideal mount would be self leveling when the radar is in use and locked when not. will have to give this some thought...wpsalm

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[wpsalm]

Thanks for your offer Brian will send you a pm.....Brock

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[jzaat]

I havemy radar mounted on one of these american Self-leveling devices.
So far (after 3 years, including transatlantic crossing) is has worked perfectly!
No signs of wear on the cable, or from the display for that matter.
Would surely recommend it, gives perfect image in every weather.

Jeroen

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