TackTick Wireless Instruments

[Talbot]

The boat I did my Yachtmaster exam on had tack tick. It must have been about 5 years old. The tack tick did not work at night.

[Pblais]

The tack tick did not work at night.

The Wind Instrument wil operate for 3 days in total darkness so they claim. They have enough power stored to do that. They go indefinitely in gray very overcast weather as well. I've seen that. Wind also would work on a steel boat. We had no trouble reading wind on our CSY with solid glass decks. How you might set up a full ssytem on a metal boat would be a better question put to the manufacturer.

I sure wouldn't sail in any place that was totally dark for days on end. I consider the latitudes above 66 degrees to be a navigation error.

[Pblais]

The only problem that i know of is the receiver is near carbon, it stops the mast head unit connecting to the receiver, they can working around this apparently

I'm not sure I understand what you are saying. When you turn on the receiver it transmits a "who is out there signal" for a period of time to wake up any of the transmitters. I'm not sure what "carbon" you might refer to.

[Talbot]

Originally Posted by Pblais

The Wind Instrument wil operate for 3 days in total darkness so they claim. <snip> I sure wouldn't sail in any place that was totally dark for days on end. I consider the latitudes above 66 degrees to be a navigation error.

This was in the Solent, in mid summer, with sunshine throughout the day. Furthermore, I had to change boats 3 times due to defects, and the problem with the TackTick was common to all of them.

I would definitely not fit them, and if I purchased a boat with them, I would replace them.

[Ex-Calif]

Originally Posted by Christian Van H

The instruments are all solar with several days worth of reserve battery power. They're quite popular. Anyone with personal experience?

Tacktick : World Leaders in Marine Wireless Instruments

We had TackTick compass mounted on the mast of the previous J24 I raced. It worked a charm. The other positive was that it floats - ask me how I know...

On the new boat we are going to eventually add compass, speed and depth by tacktick.

For me it's good stuff.

[rjrendemd]

How do the tick Tacks sending units keep from getting stray signals from other boats with similiar instruments? Are there microswitches that you set a code with or are they matched at the factory?

[Windgeist]

I am very interested in Tacktick and have been muling of the purchase of them more than anything else I have for our boat.

I have heard reports that the wind instrument doesn't read well in the 0-5/8 knot range...anyone here experienced this?

How about the battery life? These things are NOT inexpensive, and though you easily make up the $$ with the inexpensive installation cost, my concern is what the cost could be to have the batteries replaced. I asked this question the the Tacktick rep at the Annapolis show and he replied that they haven't had to replace any yet so he couldn't tell me what the estimated cost would be??????? They use lithium batteries. Well thats the same/similar thats in my cell phone and I know how they last, not more that a few years at best!!!

[Serrano]

I recently fitted a whole bunch of instrumentation to my newly purchased Chris White catamaran. Three of us spent several days working on the wired stuff (FLS, chartplotter, radar, VHF remote station); TackTick was about 2 hrs for wind (including trip up mast) with two screens (cockpit and pilothouse), two repeaters and NMEA sender. Nice and easy. All worked straight out of box. Two problems: one wind screen has weak reception and is being replaced under warranty. And no-one told me that the Maxi repeater is pretty useless unless you also buy the remote control unit to control all the smart stuff it can do - not a cheap extra! The dealers I dealt with did NOT understand this stuff. And the manuals are worse than the 1960s Japanese ones (remember them?), but its pretty easy to work out what's going on once you start to use them.

No problems with light winds (seems very sensitive to me) and has worked fine on two all-nighters. I love em

[Christian Van H]

One of the cooler features of these units seems to be this; after sailing all day, you can snap off the displays from their helm mounts and take them below...where they will still work. Watch wind speed from your bunk, etc. Pilothouse owners could, if they wanted, use just one set of displays for both helms. Pretty neat...

[psteele235]

I just installed the wind instrument - I already had the depth and speed box installed.

Powered them up so they found each other before the vane and anenometer were installed at masthead as instructed.

Turn both displays on and....nothing! No wind, depth or speed info.

Anyone have any ideas, please?

Thank you.