Wind vane on front of boat?

[BugzyCan]

My Macgregor 26 mast goes up a down a lot, for transport, and the windvane has to be removed. I have put the mast up a couple of times before attaching it too, which is a real PITA. Hoping to find a more permanent solution that would let me leave it attached to the boat, mast down and in transit.
Wondering if I switched to a wireless setup, and put the wind indicator at front of boat, in front of foresail, if that would work, or would the wind be too distorted there, or inaccurate? Does it have to go at top of mast?


How about up high off back of boat?

[jamhass]

Higher is better to read undisturbed air. Bow is wet, and likely fatal to wind instruments. Best to remember to mount the instrument before rigging the mast.

[thomm225]

When I raced beach cats, my wind vanes were always attached to the forward bridle wires dead center of the boat.

It was perfect to read the apparent wind especially on the downwind run

Combining that with tell tales on the sails and cassette tape on the shrouds you always had a good idea of the wind

Upwind there was always the feel of the wind on your face and the waves.....

For the cruising boat I have now (a Bristol 27) all I have as far as wind indicators are the tell tales on the jib and feel of the wind on my body.

Plus the waves etc

[Brian.D]

Sail twist: wind speed and angle of attack at the top of the mast is different than at sea level. Keep the wind vane at the top but add tell-tales to the spreaders, just in case your forget.

[thomm225]

If you are not racing, it doesn't really matter where the wind indicator is.

And do folks really look up to the top of their mast to see the wind direction/angle when you have the waves and tell tales much closer to eye level?

Plus feel of the wind on your body.....

[thinwater]

I run instruments on the masthead AND twin indicators on the pulpit (trimaran). I picked up the bow wind indicator habit from beach cats, and all that sail with me like them. They save a lot of looking up, both sailing, anchoring , and raising sail.




But they do NOT read the same as the masthead fly. The jib is a big influence.





I run one on each side and have used many brands. The ones with clamps for dinghies (Scheafer Minihawk, Harken Black Max) are easiest to rig.

But on a mono or tri they will read wrong by a bit. When I had cats I ran them on the bows and they read true. They were far enough from the jib.


The other problem is breaking them under sail. The reacher or chute is deadly and the jib is a problem. You need to either rig guard lines to a sprit or make an unbreakable design (flexible wand with yarn).


Actual instruments (linked to autohelm) need to be at the masthead.