Top tip re towing your dinghy

[lustyd]

I’m not sure why you’re arguing here. It’s clear what I meant and you’re imagining I said something else. Perhaps you need to get out sailing.

 

[capnsensible]

In TSS you’re specifically required to not change course when crossing. It can take a long time to cross both lanes, during which ships you didn’t see when you entered will come and go. We would have happily changed course and I told the ship as much, however there were three other ships approaching which would have become collision potentials had we (illegally) changed course.

Breaking the colregs isn’t a sensible course of action at all and could very well end with action against you as the skipper.

Explain where it says that. See Rule 10.

Crossing a scheme at frght angles to the traffic flow gets across the vessels quicker, not the scheme itself.

 

[lustyd]

Explain where it says that. See Rule 10.

Crossing a scheme at frght angles to the traffic flow gets across the vessels quicker, not the scheme itself.

You’re saying that a yacht under sail crosses fastest with a heading at right angles to the lane then? If so, you’ve just changed yacht racing quite drastically, I can’t believe they never thought of just changing their heading to the mark.
My yacht doesn’t and neither has any yacht I’ve sailed unless I get lucky with the wind.

 

[capnsensible]

You’re saying that a yacht under sail crosses fastest with a heading at right angles to the lane then? If so, you’ve just changed yacht racing quite drastically, I can’t believe they never thought of just changing their heading to the mark.
My yacht doesn’t and neither has any yacht I’ve sailed unless I get lucky with the wind.

I haven't changed anything at all. I specifically stated that crossing traffic at right angles to the traffic, not the scheme.

Nothing to do with 'mark' it's a simple rate of change of bearing exercise. You may wish to re read.....

 

[lustyd]

It doesn’t though. The heading which moves the yacht fastest across the lane would also clear the vessels faster. The rule is heading, not course, and that will often be slower to cross the path of vessels.

 

[Chiara’s slave]

Unless you’re sailing a fast multihull, that 90 deg to the TSS is almost always going to maximise your VMG across the lanes. It might not always be true for us, we’d have to weigh up the risks and advantages on merit. But mostly go straight across. I’ve never raced through them, that must be tricky. If I were PRO I’d write something into the S.I.’s. In Cowes Week you can be disqualified for impeding shipping, though obviously every boat in every class crosses a lane, sometimes multiple times.

 

[lustyd]

I’ve never raced through them, that must be tricky.

My mention of racing was to make the point that setting your heading to the next mark only works in motorboats because yachts often get there faster on other headings it’s why we tack and gybe. I can’t believe it’s even a discussion here.
How many races have you won by aiming straight at each mark?

 

[Chiara’s slave]

My mention of racing was to make the point that setting your heading to the next mark only works in motorboats because yachts often get there faster on other headings it’s why we tack and gybe. I can’t believe it’s even a discussion here.
How many races have you won by aiming straight at each mark?

A few at Datchet water In the Solent and south coast, none, as you know. Sailing a boat like the XOD, tidal tactics are sometimes extreme. The channel TSS, does the tide ever exceed 2kn? And it’s pretty much 6.5 hours each way, in line with the big traffic. So tidally, you’d go straight across. Racing, if the rhumb line crosses it diagonally, you’ve got yourself a problem. The Fastnet boats must do that. Someone here is bound to have done it.

 

[dunedin]

A few at Datchet water In the Solent and south coast, none, as you know. Sailing a boat like the XOD, tidal tactics are sometimes extreme. The channel TSS, does the tide ever exceed 2kn? And it’s pretty much 6.5 hours each way, in line with the big traffic. So tidally, you’d go straight across. Racing, if the rhumb line crosses it diagonally, you’ve got yourself a problem. The Fastnet boats must do that. Someone here is bound to have done it.

Many races now have the TSS defined as exclusion zones to avoid issues of people bending the rules for advantage over more honest competitors.
But we seem to have diverted a long way from dinghy towing - or do giant tankers tow a dinghy astern?

 

[lustyd]

Again though, I wasn’t talking about racing across a TSS. In a race you have to get to the next mark or the finish, and the fastest way to get there is almost never setting a heading directly to it. The old joke about heading for anywhere but the destination applied here.

 

[Chiara’s slave]

Again though, I wasn’t talking about racing across a TSS. In a race you have to get to the next mark or the finish, and the fastest way to get there is almost never setting a heading directly to it. The old joke about heading for anywhere but the destination applied here.

And again, the fastest way across is almost always at 90 degrees heading. Unless it’s dead downwind. If it’s dead upwind, it seems we should motor.

Towing a dinghy is definitely not expediting your progress through the TSS. Would anyone seriously consider that?

 

[lustyd]

And again, the fastest way across is almost always at 90 degrees heading.

So when racing you do set your heading directly at each mark in turn? I’ve never seen that as a tactic, but I guess if it’s the fastest way it’ll catch on. Probably makes polars a bit pointless.

 

[Chiara’s slave]

So when racing you do set your heading directly at each mark in turn? I’ve never seen that as a tactic, but I guess if it’s the fastest way it’ll catch on. Probably makes polars a bit pointless.

The tide is at 90 degrees to you, in alignment with the TSS. The fastest way across is straight across the tide, unless tacking upwind or down. And that is discouraged. When swimming across a river, what do you do? I much prefer the quickest way.
Your COG may or may not be at 90 degrees, but your heading should be. There is no mark, just a long boundary.

 

[lustyd]

The tide is at 90 degrees to you

It isn’t always. In fact quite often isn’t.

When swimming across a river

Swimming speed isn’t affected by point of sail though so not really relevant.

There is no mark

In racing there is. Which is what I was talking about. Nothing to do with TSS, all to do with fastest way to get somewhere in an arbitrary direction. If the fastest way to get anywhere was to point the bow at it then sailors are doing a lot of stuff wrong!

 

[pmartin127]

What was, I assume, a light hearted posting about which quarter a tender should be towed from to avoid the outflow of the holding tank has completely degenerated into a several page tit for tat about how cross TSSs, length of painter, whether ColRegs should be followed to the letter or not and all sorts of other unconnected trivia.
Why can't certain people just leave all that out?
I know it's my own fault for reading the whole thread but I did thinking that there might be something useful after the first few posts but I was mistaken.

 

[Chiara’s slave]

It isn’t always. In fact quite often isn’t.

Swimming speed isn’t affected by point of sail though so not really relevant.

In racing there is. Which is what I was talking about. Nothing to do with TSS, all to do with fastest way to get somewhere in an arbitrary direction. If the fastest way to get anywhere was to point the bow at it then sailors are doing a lot of stuff wrong!

I was under the impression we were still talking TSS, I seem to remember writing it in every post. Rather obviously, it can be absolutely anywhere when you’re racing round the cans. Why that is in any way relevant here is beyond me. The thread had got as far as racing through the TSS. Why that, I don’t know. If you want to discuss racing round the cans in strong tide, yes, in the summer I do that one day in 2. In a slow boat, mostly.

 

[lustyd]

Why that is in any way relevant here is beyond me

I put that in pretty much every post too. Anyway, apparently conversation isn’t allowed and I have nothing to add on dinghy towing so

 

[capnsensible]

It doesn’t though. The heading which moves the yacht fastest across the lane would also clear the vessels faster. The rule is heading, not course, and that will often be slower to cross the path of vessels.

I don't think you are getting this......

 

[lustyd]

I don't think you are getting this......

I get it just fine, you all seem to drive motorboats. Anyway need to stop now it’s upsetting pmartin

 

[ylop]

never rely solely on your VHF to avoid a collision, you may have misunderstood, they may have misunderstood, you may have identified the wrong vessel, they may have identified the wrong vessel.

AIS makes that very unlikely.

AIS in combination with DSC makes it less likely that you call the wrong vessel or the wrong vessel replies (assuming of course that you correctly match what you see to what the AIS displays and don’t have any fat finger moments - which in a busy TSS *might* be higher risk than calling the wrong name). It doesn’t prevent any of the other potential opportunities for confusion.

In our case we watched them change course immediately so zero danger.

Good - I’d suggest it’s still not “zero danger”.

In the same situation I’d do the same again

I’m not telling you that you shouldn’t - I wasn’t there and as you have provided minimal detail couldn’t say what I would or would not have done, although I wouldn’t have asked a vessel following a TSS what its intentions were, as that seems fairly obvious, I might have called them to tell them my intentions (most likely to change speed and or course so as not to impede them).