mlthomas
Well-Known Member
On a long cruise of say, 14 day plus, what watch pattern would be recommended for a crew of two? Take the two weeks as a minimum, say it was the ARC??
What Watch?
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wotayottie
Well-Known Member
Depends more than anything else on the individuals. Some people cant sleep during daylight hours whilst others, like me, can sleep anywhere anytime.
Personally I would go for 1800 to 2400, 2400 to 0600, 0600 to 1000 and free between 10000 and 1800. But thats because I might be able to sleep any time but I need a six hour stretch to do it properly. And I absolutely love the 2400 to 0600 watch.
I can catch up on the balance of my 8 hours during the day.
Personally I would go for 1800 to 2400, 2400 to 0600, 0600 to 1000 and free between 10000 and 1800. But thats because I might be able to sleep any time but I need a six hour stretch to do it properly. And I absolutely love the 2400 to 0600 watch.
I can catch up on the balance of my 8 hours during the day.
snowleopard
Well-Known Member
Do you really need a formal watch system? It depends on how well you get on. In the case of a husband & wife crew it may be better just to play it by ear. Our normal routine is that SWMBO does approx 2300-0500 and I do the rest. If one of us is particularly tired we might ask the other to take over fo an hour or two. We've worked that system for a W-E Atlantic crossing and it suits us well. Swmbo has the stronger stomach and does most of the galley work while I do navigation and maintenance.
If you feel you need a system that is 'seen to be fair' I would go for 4 hour watches during the day and 3 at night.
mlthomas
Well-Known Member
Good point, me n swmbo are as one, so no issue with having a formal watch however we have never needed to do so. Next year we are looking to bring ourselves up to doing some long sails and have no idea what works in the real world with watches.
I like to think we would have a pragmatic view of things but some idea of what others do would be good. I was reading the saphireoflondon bloggy thing and they had two 6hr stints and four 3hr stints and I thought after a week or so I wouldn’t know my a from my e, as for swmbo well I’m sure there are scarier things at sea...............somewhere
We are on the start of a 10 (12) year plan, learning all the things most on the forum know. Next year, for example, we want to have our holiday on the south coast (which we love) – a 600 mile sail no mean feat, for us anyway.
I like to think we would have a pragmatic view of things but some idea of what others do would be good. I was reading the saphireoflondon bloggy thing and they had two 6hr stints and four 3hr stints and I thought after a week or so I wouldn’t know my a from my e, as for swmbo well I’m sure there are scarier things at sea...............somewhere
We are on the start of a 10 (12) year plan, learning all the things most on the forum know. Next year, for example, we want to have our holiday on the south coast (which we love) – a 600 mile sail no mean feat, for us anyway.
jdc
Well-Known Member
I strongly advise a formal watch system: even when it's a family trip over one night we use it and I use the same system when 2 handed ocean racing. Of course that said it's only what works for me (us!).
There are (obviously) two watches A and B. We tend not to change over half way, keeping the pattern throughout the voyage, but you could change over every three or four days if you like.
A B comment
20:00 - 23:00 off evening star sight
off 23:00 - 02:00
02:00 - 05:00 off morning star sight
off 05:00 - 08:00 bake bread
08:00 - 0900 08:00 - 09:00 breakfast
09:00 - 13:00 snooze as required, do maintenance
13:00 - 14:00 13:00 - 14:00 lunch, midday (approx) sight
snooze as required 14:00 - 18:00 do maintenance, fish etc
18:00 - 20:00 18:00 - 20:00 dinner, social time, Herb's radio net etc
[anyone know how to insert tables - do I have to resort to writing html?]
Works for me - I get nearly 6hrs sleep over night and can add to this during the day.
Final point: make sure the off wach person gets undressed and brushes their teeth and goes to bed properly! It takes only 3 minutes and the quality of rest is incomparable.
There are (obviously) two watches A and B. We tend not to change over half way, keeping the pattern throughout the voyage, but you could change over every three or four days if you like.
A B comment
20:00 - 23:00 off evening star sight
off 23:00 - 02:00
02:00 - 05:00 off morning star sight
off 05:00 - 08:00 bake bread
08:00 - 0900 08:00 - 09:00 breakfast
09:00 - 13:00 snooze as required, do maintenance
13:00 - 14:00 13:00 - 14:00 lunch, midday (approx) sight
snooze as required 14:00 - 18:00 do maintenance, fish etc
18:00 - 20:00 18:00 - 20:00 dinner, social time, Herb's radio net etc
[anyone know how to insert tables - do I have to resort to writing html?]
Works for me - I get nearly 6hrs sleep over night and can add to this during the day.
Final point: make sure the off wach person gets undressed and brushes their teeth and goes to bed properly! It takes only 3 minutes and the quality of rest is incomparable.
Last edited:
Cruiser2B
Well-Known Member
How do you get a "fair" mix of 3 and 4-hour watches in a 24-hour period?
This sounds quite reasonable, though I can't say I've tried it. SWMBO and I are also in the planning stage, and will work it out when we get out there. That said, I've plenty of experience with different watch cycles (Navy) and have studied a lot of the research into sleep deprivation. The US military did a comprehensive study decades ago - the gist being that going without sleep had an almost immediate and profound effect on cognitive functions, but manual tasks did not suffer appreciably; and that the research indicated the best compromise sleep plan (for soldiers to maintain combat effectiveness) was a solid block of sleep of at least 4-hours and a 20-40 minute nap at some other point in each 24-hour period. The researchers believed that a minimum amount of REM sleep and deep sleep was required to maintain useable, albeit diminished cognitive functioning.
The problem with a lot of sleep research is that it concentrated on studying total sleep deprivation rather than chronic partial sleep deprivation, as would be the case with a couple sharing watchkeeping responsibilities. There has been more recent research into the effects of chronic sleep loss, and the results tend to support the findings above. Mild to moderate losses (5-7 hours of sleep per day) resulted in a measurable loss of cognitive functions - this occurred in the first two days, then the subjects stabilised and maintained a slightly diminished capacity. When given only a 4-hour period of sleep daily, the subjects' cognitive functions plummeted rapidly in the first two days and continued to diminish over the remainder of the studies (7 days for one, 14 for another).
So I think having at least a 5 or 6-hour watch in the mix will allow the off-person to do their wind-down and wake-up routine and still get that minimum 4 hours. Besides the 2 six-hour and 4 three-hour system, I might consider 4 and 8-hour watches, and try to split the dark hours evenly.
V1701
Well-Known Member
3 hours on, 3 hours off between 6pm & 6am...
...worked fine for 2 crew on 10 day passage across Indian Ocean. Outside of that (i.e. daylight hours) ad hoc...
David
...worked fine for 2 crew on 10 day passage across Indian Ocean. Outside of that (i.e. daylight hours) ad hoc...
David
Kukri
Well-Known Member
I think, with Tilman, that two hours at the helm is long enough, but unlike him I like to get my head down and have six hours off, so I combine the two, with short and very long watches.
Sandyman
Well-Known Member
This sounds quite reasonable, though I can't say I've tried it. SWMBO and I are also in the planning stage, and will work it out when we get out there.
Tis what we did. Worked ok until I found myself doing the forenoon, afternoon, 1st dog, 2nd dog, first, middle & morning. Only joking of course. What we did find was that we fell into a routine which suited both of us as far as sleep requirements.
Tis what we did. Worked ok until I found myself doing the forenoon, afternoon, 1st dog, 2nd dog, first, middle & morning. Only joking of course. What we did find was that we fell into a routine which suited both of us as far as sleep requirements.
mandlmaunder
Well-Known Member
3 on 3 off , ish
We use the same system as bjbreeze and find it works early well for the two of us and even better with 3 crew as it becomes 3 on 6 off.
If one of us gets sleepy on watch then they must wake the other, and if one of us over sleeps(we dont set alarms) and the other is wide awake and happy then we wait for them to awaken at their own time.
This has seen us through several 6 or more day voyages.
Our reasoning on the night watch is that I am convinced that the person on watch on a large and fast vessel is not giving their full attention to keeping watch but will be watching TV or reading or some such other distraction and only looking at radar occasionally.
Good luck and keep us informed on your progress.
We use the same system as bjbreeze and find it works early well for the two of us and even better with 3 crew as it becomes 3 on 6 off.
If one of us gets sleepy on watch then they must wake the other, and if one of us over sleeps(we dont set alarms) and the other is wide awake and happy then we wait for them to awaken at their own time.
This has seen us through several 6 or more day voyages.
Our reasoning on the night watch is that I am convinced that the person on watch on a large and fast vessel is not giving their full attention to keeping watch but will be watching TV or reading or some such other distraction and only looking at radar occasionally.
Good luck and keep us informed on your progress.
rivonia
Well-Known Member
Like most other couples we start with 4hr watches and then revert to the 3hr system, It suits us. Crossed Atlantic bothways and have never had a crew at any time.
Each to there own.
Peter
Each to there own.
Peter
