Hand held is fine if you've got the
charts to track progress and position on with the chart inaccuracies noted for blind
fog conditions. If it fails you can fall back on DR or even one of those mobile phones with Sat Nav positional fix on it (for your mid-day plot). Mine is independent of
phone signal by the way, it's not just a road
route finder. It may lose the net based road, but doesn't lose where it's at. You just need a car
power socket on your 12v to keep it charged.
I'd worry more about the accumulation of things you'll never need, hopefully, that cruisers carry about with them. Things are more likely to go wrong on that first trip.
Toilets nowadays should have catch
tanks with three days capacity. Most marina's will expect that in warmer civilised places.
I agree with splitting the water
storage, and would suggest a rain gathering system to boost your
washing water, or in
emergency, drinkable. I'm fitting potable quality flexible pipes as water
tanks, to keep the boat dry, the water clean, and compartmentalised. I'd be happy with jerry cans for the first couple of weeks falling back onto sterilised tankage after tht. Be careful with the taps at the user end. Normal twist taps don't always get shutoff properly, if you are on an
electric pump you can lose a tank full in dribbles. I'm considering a day tank, say five litres, for the kitchen sink and hand-basin, with hand pumped sea water to the sink. It's happened to me on a day
cruise, I took it on board as an issue.
That day tank could be
solar warmed on a self circulating system.
Solar panels work best at 'normal' temperatures, a
cooling blanket behind them will keep them working better and keep my ready to use
washing water warm. Just need the right place.
Weather data is necessary for your
safety, a hand held VHF is necessary for your liferaft/grab bag with the smoke and night flares as appropriate.
If you are considering this as a
delivery run then it is really is minimum but necessary
safety equipment that will form the back up system when she's fully fitted.
My old boat has all the
electrical distribution at the stern (engine bay) and all the switches at the front of the
cabin. I'm going to split those to put the nav stuff at the
helm.
I'd suggest too that the internal
electrical equipment should be accessible in full wets from the
cockpit without upsetting or disturbing the off watch crew. Depends on how much the supplier is building in.
Fuel is another matter, if your standing
rigging has a fault it could go
overboard at mid
passage. Can you carry enough
fuel, and spare
rope and
sails to jury rig and get home before the water runs out? A
water maker is reliable but could also fail in the same way, and always at the worst time.
Securing your stores will be a problem in a bare boat. Will the
builder bolt some boxes to the floor so you can keep stuff dry and in place when the
weather kicks up? All those water and fuel cans will need to be secured too. Netting to strong points?
You may gather that I've been planning a long time and not sailing for long, these comments are here for you to note or ignore as you please. They are things I go through on sleepless nights when the moon is high. Trying to reduce the fear factor with advanced planning. 11,000 miles sounds a big trip.
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