How Old is Your Nav Equipment?

[sailorchic34]

One note. I keep my old heathkit depth sounder and the old autohelm 3000 autopilot aboard as they are fairly easy to repair. I have full plans for the heathkit and I've replaced the darlingtons and a few caps in the autohelm a time or two over the years. Plus added a wireless remote to it for $13. Can't do that with a newer autopilot.

The newer equipment is not user repairable generally speaking. Even if they are engineers.

Mind you I did replace the 30+ year old VHF radio 10 years ago with a shiny new icon. Electronics generally are easy to upgrade and add little to the sale price of a boat. Sort of like wall or carpet color in a house. The new owner will want something newer/different anyway.

[JerseyJoe]

Originally Posted by Gadagirl

This thread comes at a perfect time for me as I'll be starting serious boat shopping in a few months time.

I was wondering when comparing boats how much faith to put into navigation/electronics and their age? So, if it has some extras such as radar, chart plotter etc., 2008 or newer, it might be worth closer to their asking price? As opposed to a boat that has 10+ year old equipment? Even though the older equipment may still have a lot of life left in them?

Personally I agree with Sailorchic34. Buy the bare boat with good bones and add the electronics package that you are comfortable with using. The value is in the boat being seaworthy, not who has the most complex, dated electronics package that they want you to compensate them for in a jacked up purchase price.

[Mithril Bham]

Originally Posted by conchaway

I have found that a current chart, a parallel rule, a divider, a nautical slide rule, and a compass never go out of date.
Best of Luck!

Don't forget a regular chart. Most important of all.

[TrentePieds]

As you are an airborne pilot we can stop worrying about you :-)



No harm in having the mod cons. none at all. Just as long as you can stay safe without them!



The transition from airborne to seaborne pilot is a piecacake. You already know about dead virgins and about the essential trinomial: SDT. From there on you can do the calculations required for coast-wise pilotage in your head.


The most difficult part of that transition is to become comfortable with the fact than when you reduce you speed to zero, you won't sink like a stone :-). You've got to become comfortable with the fact that you are going ten knots – not three or four hundred. And that you don't do your chart work on an inadequate little pad on your knee as we did in my day as a glider pilot.


Somebody twitted me that what I do isn't adequate at night and in fog. Well, yes it is, actually – but I don't DO night and fog. Why would I? I sail for fun – not for money. In the Salish Sea it's a rare time that you are more than an hour from a hidey-hole, so there is no need to “press on”. It can blow in the Salish Sea, though in the summer, in the middle of the straits, it gets BORING! There are summer afternoons when you can blow smoke rings and they will hang there for many minutes. But again, there is always a hidey-hole to duck into if it really does start to blow, and the wet patch you are sitting in isn't sea water :-)!


Fog can arise out of nowhere in just a few minutes, but it'll be just a smallish patch due to the complicated tidal flows of waters of different temperatures in these waters. When a patch appears, you just go around it, or you wait for an hour. till it clears. No need to enter it. I have never yet had fog arise all around me, but even if it did, within a minute or two, I would have updated my plot and know within thirty feet where I was, and DR would take me out of the patch. Safely.


In Canadian waters you can ALMOST always trust the BC Ferries to stick to their appointed tracks which are marked on the charts. I'm not so sure the same can be said for the Washington State Ferries. BC ferries are very diligent in sending a “securité” when entering Active Pass. If you are in the pass and a ferry calls on Ch16 “entering Active Southbound. Concerned vessels please respond” you just quietly duck into Miner's Bay till the ferry is gone. Crossing the ferry tracks coming out of the Swartz Bay terminal I like to stay half a mile off. If a ferry begins to move, which I will know because, in compliance the rules, I'm keeping my beady eye on them, I have plenty of time to skedaddle and show him my stern. No need to clutter the airwaves. Showing your stern is universally understood. At sea as well as on land ;-)!


I don't think I've ever had a reputation for being a wienie – but I AM safety-conscious. To the point that some people shake their heads and ask “Is that really necessary?” Comes from having taught a great many lubbers the rudiments :-)!



TP

[redhead]

Not a pilot, just in an adjunct profession. Retired.

[JPA Cate]

I haven't used an RDF for years, but you know, magellan, you could still pick up radio stations with it, and it could help you back to closer to shore in the rain or fog. Might not want to get too close though.

Ann

[jkindredpdx]

Originally Posted by Gadagirl

This thread comes at a perfect time for me as I'll be starting serious boat shopping in a few months time.

I was wondering when comparing boats how much faith to put into navigation/electronics and their age? So, if it has some extras such as radar, chart plotter etc., 2008 or newer, it might be worth closer to their asking price? As opposed to a boat that has 10+ year old equipment? Even though the older equipment may still have a lot of life left in them?

The gear on my boat was so old, or nonexistent, that the PO couldn't possibly think of it as an asset.... consequently, I was buying the bones of the boat, not the accessories. I've come to see that as a bonus that I wasn't buying 5-10 year old electronics that the PO would think made their boat worth a premium.