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  • Original Iridium GO! Still a Better Deal Than Exec

    12 CommentsReading Time: 3 minutesFree

    There’s a headline to provoke screams and tearing of hair.

    After all, the new Iridium GO! Exec is 40 times faster than the original GO! and only twice the price, so it’s gotta be the the better deal…right?

    And you can get unlimited data with the original GO! from lots of places for $154.95/month and unlimited for the Exec from PredictWind for $169.95, just a $15/month difference.

    So at this point you must be thinking that the old fart who runs this site has finally and completely slipped his cams when writing that headline.

    Nope.

    As so often in these things, the reason that GO! original is still a better deal than Exec is in the fine print.

    Look at the screenshots at the top of this tip, and see if you can spot it.

    You got it, with the original GO! unlimited plan you get unlimited data minutes for:

    • Email
    • Snapshots of any page on the internet: news, stock prices, whatever.
    • Weather maps unavailable from PredictWind.
    • Really vital weather information unavailable from PredictWind—more in an upcoming article.

    Anything we want, any time we want, as much as we want.

    Sure it’s slow, but so what, we don’t have to stand there and watch it, at least if we use decent software to run it.

    We ran this business, including a ton of email, when out of cell phone range on the original GO! unlimited data plan, and downloaded a bunch of weather data, without ever needing to use more than an hour or so a day.

    But with GO! Exec the “unlimited” is restricted to PredictWind data only!

    Yup, the way I read it, after we buy the “unlimited” package for $169.95/month, we need to then add a data minutes package if we want anything other than stuff from PredictWind.

    And it’s not even clear to me that we would be able to get our email under the “unlimited”.

    So sounds to me like we are going to need to buy say 10MB (not going to go far) for another $40 if we want to venture out of the PredictWind world, and maybe even if we want our email within it.

    And note they are charging data by the megabit, not connected time, so the much vaunted speed of Exec is not going to help.

    Begs the question: when is unlimited, limited?

    To make this worse, in their Exec FAQ, PredictWind claims that the unlimited package avoids “bill shock”. But what happens if you don’t buy an added data package, or do and go over it? Don’t know for sure, but I also don’t want to be the one to find out!

    My Recommendations:

    1. Stick with original Iridium GO! and the unlimited plan.
      • I know for sure that package is…unlimited. In several years of use for anything I wanted, including sending super-stupid grinning selfies to my daughter, there was not one single added invoice over and above the unlimited monthly charge.
    2. If you really need a fast solution? Go Starlink as well.
      • Exec, even 40 times faster, is way too slow to actually do anything useful on the internet.
    3. And if you need a solution to take into the liferaft, something Exec does do better than the original GO!, buy a secondhand Iridium handset.
      • There should be plenty around at good prices from people who bought limited unlimited.

    Limited Unlimited?

    One final thought:

    It would be nice if Iridium and PredictWind would be a bit more careful with the word “unlimited”. On this page they specifically write “Unlimited Data”.

    Look it up in the dictionary, guys. The way I read it, “unlimited” means without limits or restrictions. And “data” means all digital data, at least to me, not just that originating at PredictWind.

    I just can’t see how you can be a little bit unlimited, or a little limited when you’re unlimited…OK, I’ll stop.

    More on how we downloaded and analyzed the weather using the original GO!

    This Online Book needs updating. It’s on my list for this winter. That said, the fundamentals are still relevant and can save you a lot of weather-related grief.

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    12 comments

  • Do We Need A $10,000 Plotter?

    2 CommentsReading Time: 2 minutesFree

    I just read a post over at Panbo on Garmin’s new top-of-the-line plotters that start at US$10,000 and go up from there.

    And, of course, to take advantage of all the features we will need to spend a bunch more on supporting gear.

    I’m sure those who are so inclined will be obsessing over all the cool features of these new plotters.

    But to me the bigger question is the opportunity cost of this stuff: What else we could spend ten to twenty, or even more, boat units on?

    A few suggestions for far more important things we could do with that much money on say a 40-foot cruising boat:

    All of the above will contribute far more to cruising safety and enjoyment than the ultimate plotter-based marine electronics system.

    Does that include the keel, rigging and rudder? Yup. If we are at sea with even the slightest nagging suspicion that all is not well in those areas, we will not be having fun!

    Got all that done and still have money in the bank? Sure, go buy a ten-grand plotter.

    I get that we need a good navigation system, but that can be done for way less in a bunch of different ways.

    Never forget to think about the opportunity cost of cool stuff.

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    2 comments

  • No, Lithium Batteries Don’t Burn Boats

    7 CommentsReading Time: 2 minutesFree

    Every so often, someone sends me a link to this article, originally published in Professional Boat Builder and repeated at Sailing Anarchy, that starts with the line:

    Lithium-ion batteries start fires.

    First off, the author does not differentiate between lithium cobalt oxide (the battery type in your phone) and lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO), the chemistry generally used for service batteries on boats, which is much safer and less volatile.

    In fact, recently, ABYC tried to set one of the latter types on fire and had no luck.

    Second, he goes on to say that a large number of boat fires are caused by batteries.

    I don’t think that’s true.

    What I would agree to is that a large percentage of fires on boats are caused by poorly designed and installed electrical systems, and that includes those installed by the “professionals”:

    The electrical system on our new-to-us J/109, as installed by the builder in 2004, was a fire looking for a place to happen, mainly because of inadequate fusing.

    And then in the years after she was built and before we bought the boat and rebuilt the electrical system, “professionals” had made the fire risk far worse with stupid changes and additions.

    This is a distressingly common situation, and don’t make the mistake of thinking that just because your boat has passed survey that the electrical system is safe. Ours did and wasn’t.

    And don’t get me started on the dangers of electrical systems designed and installed by boat owners who watch a few YouTube videos, source lithium cells from some vendor on eBay, and have at it.

    So to me, the correct statement is:

    Lithium batteries don’t burn boats, poor battery and electrical installations burn boats, regardless of battery chemistry.

    Me

    I have written a lot more about this in this Online Book, including how to decide if lithium batteries are right for your boat:

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    7 comments

  • Blocking Highs, Love ’em Or Hate ’em

    0 CommentsReading Time: 2 minutesFree
    The way to detect and understand blocking highs is to look at the 500 mb predictions and particularly the 5640 mb line (bold on graphic above).
    The way to detect and understand blocking highs is to look at the 500 mb predictions and particularly the 5640 mb line (bold on graphic above).
    The way to detect and understand blocking highs is to look at the 500 mb predictions and particularly the 5640 mb line (bold on graphic above).

    As I write, the North Atlantic is a weather hot-mess with hurricanes and gales dotted all over the map, and yet all the models are predicting an incredible run of settled early fall weather and light winds for Nova Scotia, extending out ten days or more.

    What’s going on?

    We in Nova Scotia are falling under the protection of the weather-godfather of upper level systems: a blocking high.

    I’m loving it, since I can go rowing on quite cool mornings and sailing in the afternoon when the sea breeze kicks in on our lovely Mahone Bay.

    But if we are trying to make a passage under sail in the mid-latitudes, we will hate a blocker for its light winds. And if we are to the west of one in the northern mid-latitudes, it’s likely we will hate the stationary low pressure over us that’s blocked from moving away.

    In either case we can use this understanding to make better strategic decisions than we ever will from just looking at a surface model.

    I was about to start decommissioning our boat for winter layup, but have delayed that, and back in the day I used this information to make our cruises more comfortable and safer.

    That said, I have radically oversimplified, as is fitting for a Tip, but if you want to understand how to manage your voyages strategically, rather than just looking at models with no understanding, we have an Online Book for that:

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  • Cool Supplemental Anchor Light

    14 CommentsReading Time: < 1 minuteFree

    Some years ago Phyllis and I found out the hard way, when another yacht hit us, that sometimes boaters don’t look up and see anchor lights at the top of masts.

    After that accident, we fitted a supplemental all-around white light on top of the radar on our McCurdy and Rhodes 56, as is allowed under COLREGS. Definitely the best solution.

    I was just thinking about doing the same on our new-to-us J/109 when I remembered that our new B&G radar can display a blue light.

    I have to confess that when I first saw that in the installation manual I thought “well, that’s the silliest feature I have ever seen on marine electronics, and that’s saying something”.

    But now I have tried it, I take it back. And having the radar on standby with the light on medium intensity only uses 0.2 A at 12 volts.

    And since it’s blue, a colour that is not used for any lights prescribed by the COLREGS, I’m pretty sure it’s perfectly legal under Rule 30.

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    14 comments

  • Sneaky Power Users

    4 CommentsReading Time: 2 minutesFree

    We were on the boat for a couple of days last weekend and one evening I decided to check email and the weather on my iPad.

    But when I picked it up, it turned out I had forgotten to charge it—it was as dead as John Cleese’s parrot.

    Not a problem, we have a USB charging port on the boat and a USB C (it’s a newish iPad) cable.

    I plugged in the iPad and, since this had reminded me, my iPhone 13, then at about 50% charge, into a different port.

    The photo at the top of the Tip shows the total current draw before plugging in these devices:

    • Five LED lights on below,
    • AIS with drag alarm,
    • propane sniffer,
    • boat monitoring system,
    • and two anchor lights
      • will be another Tip and is why the radar is on (in standby).

    The photo below shows current with both devices charging, and no other changes.

    Yikes, these two handheld devices are drawing 3.5 amps at 12 volts, or 160% of what it takes to power a small boat at anchor at night.

    Yes, I know, in a couple of hours or so both devices will be fully charged and only require a trickle of amps to keep them there.

    Still, suppose Phyllis charged her iPad and iPhone, too, and then maybe we have guests with devices, and then there’s the iPad we use for navigation. And many boats have one or two laptops…

    It’s stuff like this, albeit not by itself, but added to other sneaky users of amps, that push cruisers into expensive electrical system upgrades including: excessive arrays of solar panels and/or the clutter, noise, and weight of wind turbines; or a generator.

    Worth thinking about.

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  • Sail Heel Angle

    14 CommentsReading Time: 1 minuteFree

    The late, great—I know it’s a cliché but he was—Buddy Melges, when asked how to drive a boat well upwind, would say that the secret is keeping the angle between the headstay and horizon constant.

    For us lesser helmspersons, an inclinometer makes this way easier.

    I was just about to fit one to our J/109 when I realized that the smart compass I installed last winter also measures heel angle and sends that out on the NMEA 2000 network, so it was just a matter of moments to add it to one of the cockpit readouts.

    Once the boat is fully powered up, sailing a constant heel angle through the puffs and lulls is a way faster and more comfortable way to helm upwind than just following the jib telltails.

    Excessive heel is also a not-so-subtle hint that it’s time to reef.

    Nothing more than 20 degrees is fast on the J/109, flatter with a full crew on the rail.

    The M&R 56 is fastest up wind at about 23-25.

    Boats that are not as easily driven will need more heel, and full-keel boats with a lot of wetted surface are often fastest at high angles—as much as 35 degrees.

    That said, many people, particularly those new to sailing, let the boat heel too much.

    Anyway, every sailboat should have a way to display heel angle. If your autopilot compass does not have this feature, a simple inclinometer will do.

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  • Never Forget The Go-To-Sea Option

    11 CommentsReading Time: 2 minutesFree
    Screenshot of Gloucester Harbour, kindness of Google Earth.
    Screenshot of Gloucester Harbour, kindness of Google Earth.
    Screenshot of Gloucester Harbour, kindness of Google Earth.

    Have a quick read of this account of a race crew getting hit by a nasty thunderstorm when approaching their home port of Gloucester, Mass.

    Done?

    Anything jump out at you?

    The first thing that hit me is that they never even considered waiting offshore for conditions to improve, or even daylight, before trying what turned out to be a very dangerous approach.

    Sure, it would have been rough out there but the wind was in the North so they would have been in at least a partial lee from Cape Ann.

    What about running off for Cape Cod where they could have rounded up under the Hook and anchored with no lee-shore danger?

    Don’t get me wrong. I was not there and Mass Bay can be a bad place, particularly if the current is running against the wind, with limited sea room in a northerly. Maybe they made the right call.

    But by entering Gloucester they were taking huge risks because of the breakwater under their lee. They got lucky on the aborted mooring approach but it could have gone very differently: hitting another boat, getting their mooring gear or someone else’s around the prop…the list is endless. A simple engine or steering failure could have have ended in a nasty wreck.

    Have I made the same mistake? Yes. In fact, that’s why this jumped out at me.

    I try to never forget:

    • It’s not the sea that kills sailors, it’s the hard bits around the edges.
    • The very human, and understandable urge to get home can lead us to bad choices.
    • Always consider ‘staying out there’ as one of our options.

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  • Check Your Emergency Tiller

    19 CommentsReading Time: 2 minutesFree

    The stuff I have found on our new-to-us J/109 amazes me.

    When I first inspected the boat, we found that someone had siliconed the hatch over the rudder-shaft head. I guess it leaked a bit so, instead of replacing the O-ring or the hatch, they glued it down.

    My friend and ace boat technician, Pat, who is young and plenty strong, straining to get the hatch off…in pieces.
    My friend and ace boat technician, Pat, who is young and plenty strong, straining to get the hatch off…in pieces.
    My friend and ace boat technician, Pat, who is young and plenty strong, straining to get the hatch off…in pieces.

    So after we fixed that with a new hatch, I figured I should check the emergency tiller, actually a better design than found on many production boats, except that the threaded rod that was supposed to hold it in place was misaligned so it would not stay attached in use.

    No, not bent, misaligned. It had been like that since the boat was built and no one—particularly TPI who built the boat, or the two surveyors who had inspected her since—had ever thought to check whether it actually fitted.

    In half a day I both fixed the misalignment and improved the design of the retaining bolt and its bracket to make it more secure.

    Check your emergency tiller and, while doing so, assume that everyone who came before you was an incompetent, uncaring idiot. And if that turns out not to be the case, be happy.

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    19 comments

  • Don’t Trust Used Rope

    2 CommentsReading Time: 2 minutesFree

    Modern ropes are fantastically strong, to the point that, in most cases, at least on cruising boats, there is a massive margin of safety simply because the rope is generally chosen with enough diameter to be easily handled and is therefore many times stronger than the peak load.

    In fact, I can’t remember when a piece of running rigging last broke on me…until last month when I was reefing in moderate winds and the clew pennant parted off with a hell of bang—luckily no other damage was done.

    The interesting thing was that at the moment it broke it was under way less load than it had repeatedly withstood when fully reefed and sailing with the mainsheet fire-taut.

    And I had carefully inspected the old spinnaker halyard for any signs of chafe before repurposing part of it for the reefing line.

    My first guess was that the core was Aramid (Kevlar), which is notorious for failing without warning where it bends over a sheave, but the broken ends don’t look like it, and the place where it broke was not so-stressed.

    Weird.

    Heck, maybe at some time in its life the halyard had been exposed to some chemical that attacked it. Maybe the line was bought on the cheap from some no-name or even counterfeit company—apparently it happens in the climbing world.

    Anyway, regardless of what caused it, I learned a valuable lesson:

    After many decades of no failures I had become complacent about rope strength.

    Going forward I won’t repurpose, but will replace old mission-critical lines that I don’t know the history of, precisely what they are made of, by what company, and where sourced, regardless of how good they look.

    Worth thinking about when buying a used boat.

    More on running rigging here.

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    2 comments

  • Good LED Steaming/Deck Light

    8 CommentsReading Time: < 1 minuteFree

    We fitted a MarineBeam LED Steaming/Deck Light on the mast on our J/109 a year ago, and so far I’m impressed.

    Small, light, relatively inexpensive, and amazingly bright, with incredibly low current draw.

    Of course we don’t know how reliable it will be over time, but so far so good.

    By the way, I have never used deck lights at sea. Too dazzling and disorienting, and, worst of all, our own bodies throw shadows just where we want to see. Much prefer, and recommend, head lamps.

    The primary reason we have a deck light is to reduce the risk of someone running into us because they did not look up and see our masthead anchor light. Yes, it happens.

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    8 comments

  • His and Hers Autopilot Controls

    2 CommentsReading Time: < 1 minuteFree

    Phyllis and I have done a couple of crew overboard recovery drills lately (with more planned) and one of the many things we learned was that a wrist remote autopilot control is extremely useful in a COB emergency.

    But what happens if the person wearing the only control is the one who went over the side? So now we have two. Highly recommended.

    More on COB prevention and recovery.

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    2 comments

  • eWincher as a Windlass

    5 CommentsReading Time: < 1 minuteFree

    Our J/109 has a great anchor locker as well as a removable anchor roller, but no windlass, and there is no way in hell we are adding all that weight up forward on this boat.

    No worries. Our eWincher, driving a two-speed primary cockpit winch, hauls the rode as fast, or maybe a bit faster, than the massive windlass on our last boat, and there is plenty of power, to the point that I would be confident of hauling the boat up to the anchor in say 25 knots of wind.

    One small fly in the ointment: our anchor rode is 8-strand braid and catches on the stripper on the self-tailing winch, so someone must tail the line off the winch.

    Read our three-part in-depth review of eWincher to see if it’s right for you, before you blow a bunch of money on electric winches.

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    5 comments

  • What It’s Really All About

    0 CommentsReading Time: < 1 minuteFree

    A beautiful full-moon-lit evening in a lovely anchorage rafted up with good friends for a fine dinner.

    Not a lot more to say, really.

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  • Apple Watch Photo-Trigger Hack

    2 CommentsReading Time: 2 minutesFree

    I needed to get the model and serial number off the fridge unit on our J/109, but the problem is that the plate is on the far side and inaccessible, at least to an arthritic old fart.

    I was pondering using my borescope, but controlling it holding the wire would have been difficult.

    Then I remembered that I can control the iPhone camera, and even see what it sees, on my Apple watch.

    So I attached my iPhone to a selfie stick—don’t ask why I have one, it’s not why you think, I see enough of my wrinkled mug when shaving—and five minutes later the job was done.

    And the photo is way higher resolution than that produced by a borescope, so easy to zoom in on the details.

    Taking a photo of my Apple watch while in this mode produced a fun graphic, too.

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    2 comments

  • Good Fractional Rig-Tuning Article

    1 CommentReading Time: < 1 minuteFree
    A multiple-spreader fractional rig is one of the most difficult, but also one of the most rewarding, to tune right.
    A multiple-spreader fractional rig is one of the most difficult, but also one of the most rewarding, to tune right.
    A multiple-spreader fractional rig is one of the most difficult, but also one of the most rewarding, to tune right.

    We have five detailed step-by-step chapters on how to tune a masthead rig, starting here, but we don’t cover fractional rigs because they are unusual in the offshore cruising world.

    But if you do have a fractional rig, like we do on our new-to-us J/109, there’s a good tuning article over at Practical Boat Owner.

    I agree with most of it, although they do skip over the vital step of getting mast heel position and mast blocking right, but you can fill that in from our masthead tuning chapters.

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  • Don’t Forget Weather Maps

    9 CommentsReading Time: 2 minutesFree

    I have to confess that, now we are no longer cruising offshore, I have tended to get my weather information from Windy and call it good.

    But I just realized that that lazy approach was resulting in me losing the strategic and tactical feel for the weather I developed over some five decades of observing it closely.

    So this morning, for the first time in months, I took a look at the excellent weather maps produced by our friends to the south—thanks to all you US tax payers—and was immediately reminded why doing that pretty much every day before looking at raw-model output—that’s what Windy is, just prettied up—is way better.

    All the reasons for looking at forecaster-drawn maps are beyond the scope of a tip, but the most important one is that applications like Windy do not show fronts, and if we don’t know where the fronts are, and how they work, we are just plain weather-ignorant—fronts are where most of the weather that can hurt you lurks.

    To learn more, we have an Online Book. The parts about how to download the weather are out of date, but the strategic and tactical method that kept Phyllis and me safe for so many years is timeless.

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  • The Most Dangerous Thing Offshore Cruisers Do

    6 CommentsReading Time: 2 minutesFree

    Last week I linked to a well-done report and some associated testing over at Practical Boat Owner that made a convincing argument that sidedeck jacklines are worse, at least when used with a standard 6′ long tether, than not clipping on at all, because of the risk of being killed by dragging.

    And then a few days later I came across a Scuttlebutt article titled, “Nearly half die when falling overboard”, with statistics from the UK Marine Accident Investigation Branch supporting the title.

    At first I was going to link to the latest piece in a tip with a scary title like “Why We Clip On” or some such.

    But that felt kinda wrong so close to the first tip—when does informing turn into scaremongering?

    So I decided, instead, to just remind us all that offshore sailing, at least when done with common sense and basic seamanship, is pretty safe.

    Sure, people die by falling overboard. But people also die by their furniture falling on them at home.

    So what’s the most dangerous thing most cruisers do? My guess is getting into an automobile…that is, unless they are wingsuit BASE jumpers, too.

    Oh yes, here’s a link to the Scuttlebutt article, worth reading…at least as long as we keep things in perspective.

    And if you are wondering about the photo, that’s Phyllis with our good friends and experienced offshore voyagers Wilson and Thelma, taken in Quebec during our drive of the Trans-Labrador Highway in 2019.

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  • Carry Spare Banjo Fitting Washers

    21 CommentsReading Time: < 1 minuteFree

    Banjo fittings are ubiquitous on engines (there are a lot of them around, too), usually in the fuel system, but the fresh water cooling circuit often has a few as well.

    And each of them has a small copper washer each side of the fitting that acts as a seal.

    Here’s the thing: the washers are not reusable…but most people do, including many professional mechanics who should know better.

    Which is why a lot of engines are plagued with leaks.

    So it makes a lot of sense to carry a few of each size. We could buy them one by one or we can buy a lifetime supply over at McMaster-Carr.

    Thanks to my friend Wilson, who warned me about this when we bought the J/109, so I had the right washer to hand when the engine started pissing diesel fuel.

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    21 comments

  • Check Tachometer Accuracy

    6 CommentsReading Time: 2 minutesFree

    There are all kinds of good reasons to check our engine RPM, including making sure:

    • We are not overloading before the engine warms up.
    • We are not under-loading after warm up.
    • To figure out fuel burn.
    • To check that the prop is not under- or over-sized.
    • To check that the engine has not lost RPM at wide-open throttle, an early sign of all kinds of things that should be fixed before damage is done.

    But the problem is that tachometers can drift into inaccuracy.

    And an even bigger problem is that if we change our alternator to a larger and more robust one, as many of us cruisers do, and most of us should, it’s likely that the tachometer will be wildly inaccurate afterward because the new alternator sends a different number of pulses per revolution.

    Wait, there’s more. If we change to a serpentine belt, again as we should, that likely changes the ratio between the crank shaft and alternator RPM, making the inaccuracy even worse.

    The good news is that handheld RPM counters are both accurate and relatively cheap.

    And then once we know the actual RPM, it’s reasonably easy…OK, a pain in the ass…to recalibrate the tachometer.

    Phyllis spent an hour crunched up in the cockpit locker poking at the little calibration button while I read the rapidly changing numbers and yelled “press”, “let go”, “press”.

    Why an hour? Because I adjusted the wrong way…twice…but let’s not go there.

    Worth it to have an accurate tachometer, though…at least as far as I’m concerned…not asking Phyllis.

    You can usually find the calibration instructions for your tachometer online, but here’s a typical set of instructions.

    Further Reading

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  • V Booms a Great Idea

    15 CommentsReading Time: 2 minutesFree
    This one, which I saw in Lunenburg last week, is not as slick as newer V Booms in carbon, but it’s still a great way, particularly when coupled with a good lazy jack system, to tame the main.
    This one, which I saw in Lunenburg last week, is not as slick as newer V Booms in carbon, but it’s still a great way, particularly when coupled with a good lazy jack system, to tame the main.
    This one, which I saw in Lunenburg last week, is not as slick as newer V Booms in carbon, but it’s still a great way, particularly when coupled with a good lazy jack system, to tame the main.

    Pocket Boom, V Boom, Park Avenue Boom, it doesn’t much matter what we call them, these booms are a great idea that should be adopted by a lot more sailors than do.

    A great way to simplify sail handling, and make it easy to put on the sail cover, but without the complexity, weight, performance loss, and, yes, dangers of in-mast or in-boom furling systems, and way cheaper, too.

    If you are considering an automated mainsail system, do yourself a favour and think long and hard before you pull the trigger and blow a wad of cash.

    Instead, fix the slab-reefing system on your boat properly—a good 80% of the slab systems I see are poorly designed and set up—and, then, if you want to take it to the next level, buy a V Boom.

    This one from Offshore Spars looks like a nice implementation. I’m guessing it’s a derivative of the brilliantly designed V Booms that Hall Spars used to make.

    I wanted one of these in the worst way, but after we got done replacing our cracked aluminum mast, there was no money left.

    More on how to decide between in-mast, in-boom, and slab reefing. Yes, there are situations when one of the first two options makes sense…but not that many.

    And if you think in-boom systems are easier to use, watch this:

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    15 comments

  • Edson Radar Tower

    1 CommentReading Time: < 1 minuteFree

    We are really happy with the way our new radar installation came out, particularly the Edson tower.

    We have long felt that the best place for a radar is on a tower, not on the mast or backstay.

    It even inclines for when we are heeled in fog…yes, we get wind and fog here in Nova Scotia.

    And here’s a fun hack. When I got it installed it was a little wobbly due to the slight play between the tube glassed into the hull and the tower tube, so I preloaded it to the rail with Dyneema lashings—lighter and easier than struts.

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  • Take a Racer Sailing

    0 CommentsReading Time: < 1 minuteFree

    I have long argued that one of the quickest ways to become a better cruiser is to go racing as crew.

    It also works the other way around. Brooke (on the left) owns and seriously races a J/109 on Narraganset Bay. So while she was visiting with our friend Ed, she came out sailing on our J/109 and taught me a huge amount.

    This was particularly good because she owns the same boat, but even without that added advantage it’s well worth persuading a skilled racer to come sailing on your cruising boat. You will learn a lot.

    Pro tip: Racers love beer.

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  • Sidedeck Jacklines Worse Than Nothing?

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    Yours truly demonstrating where we end up—without the convenient dinghy to keep me out of the cold water (what a wuss)—if we fall in while attached to a sidedeck jackline by a standard-length tether.

    According to Practical Boat Owner (PBO), at 6 knots we only have minutes to live in this situation.
    Yours truly demonstrating where we end up—without the convenient dinghy to keep me out of the cold water (what a wuss)—if we fall in while attached to a sidedeck jackline by a standard-length tether.

    According to Practical Boat Owner (PBO), at 6 knots we only have minutes to live in this situation.
    Yours truly demonstrating where we end up—without the convenient dinghy to keep me out of the cold water (what a wuss)—if we fall in while attached to a sidedeck jackline by a standard-length tether.

    According to Practical Boat Owner (PBO), at 6 knots we only have minutes to live in this situation.

    We at AAC have long argued that sidedeck jacklines (jackstays) are not safe because of drag risk.

    But PBO are taking that up a level by suggesting, based on some very sobering testing as well as even more sobering analysis of sailors falling overboard and being dragged by their tethers, that it might even be safer to not be clipped on at all than to use a standard-length tether clipped to a sidedeck jackline.

    We agree with the problem they identify, but feel we have a better and well-tested solution that reduces drag risk to near zero while still staying tethered.

    Read the Practical Boat Owner article, highly recommended.

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  • Is Your Radio Talking to Your GPS?

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    Even though I have been working on our new-to-us J/109 off and on for nearly two years, there are still chores on the to-do list, one being to program our new MMSI number into the VHF—I did our AIS transmitter as soon as we got the boat.

    Luckily for me, although disturbing to find out, there was no MMSI number in the VHF, so the two previous owners were forgoing a big safety feature.

    I say luckily because radios and AIS transmitters sold in the USA can only be programmed once, or at most twice, at least without help from the manufacturer. Who thought that was a good idea? Homeland Security, as I understand it. Don’t get me started.

    Anyway, I had assumed that the radio was at least getting GPS positioning sentences, since there were two wires leading from the correct terminals on the radio to…the wrong terminals on the source.

    I hadn’t changed that, so clearly it had been that way for years since the “professional” hooked it up and never bothered to check it worked! Saints preserve us from “professionally maintained boats”.

    The fix took minutes and was confirmed when “GPS” came up on the panel.

    With these two problems put together, the nice red distress button on the radio was for decoration only.

    So I have made a mental note to always check the display for that indicator when I turn the radio on, since it would be easy for the wires to get disconnected or a parameter to get changed in the source GPS (say BAUD rate), rendering this important feature useless.

    By the way, while this crappy little radio is adequate for our needs, if I we were still going offshore and cruising countries where DSC is used more than it is here, we would be replacing it. More here.

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