Hard dodger, soft dodger or pilothouse?

[rexposeidon]

Great information!
My thanks to everyone.
I'll definitely be chewing on this for awhile.

[Deep Blue Water]

Hard dodger for protection against unexpected water over the bow or rail. Amel, Najad and Hallberg Rassy (and many others) feature a hard windscreen coupled with a soft dodger where you can attach additional soft sides when the weather gets nasty. To me that seems the best of both worlds.

[boatman1]

Last boat was a Tartan 37 with soft dodger & bimini. Most of the time that was just fine, but standing a three hour watch in cold rain sure got me thinking about the previous boat with a pilot house. I don’t have the hairy chested attitude required of an open cockpit in temperate climates doing multiple day/night offshore passages.The shipmates/crew don’t like it either, so guess who stands their night watches as well? No more open cockpits for this pussy.

[Kd9truck]

I sail with my soft dodger down, and yes it goes up and down when I day sail. O do have a Bimini and it dates up unless the wind goes over 40knts, I would love a hard dodger but my vessel is not constructed to make that an easy modification, and construction material is hard to find in a traditional sense for a craftsman.
Both my dodger and Bimini have reached the end of there life span and I intend on constructing my self both possibly with a mixed soft hard construction.
Wants:
Access to the Lea th of the boom that is above both the dodger and the Bimini,windows to the main sail from both helms and all portions but the frame itself to be removable.and I am leaning towards hard glass (tempered) and removable as well.

[JPA Cate]

We've had soft dodgers and hard dodgers, but never a pilot house. If it is always cold and rainy, and you still want to go out, I bet a pilot house is nice, but no experience with one.

Our first soft dodger was collapsible, and--or maybe I should say, but--we found we always wanted it up for the protection, from Calif. through Mexico, and to New Zealand. In NZ, Jim drew up a hard dodger, and had one built for the boat. It had an about 18" square opening hatch to allow good airflow to the cockpit at anchor in warm places. Loved it. Design spec was that it should be strong enough for both of us to stand on it. It was made from plywood, glassed in and out. We were able to get fine seated protection, and the hard dodger was 2" lower than the bows for the soft one, so I could easily see over it, as well as see through it. The windows were acrylic, and we conserved the forms (that the acrylic was melted enough to sag to the right shape on). So, after the knockdown that broke one of them, we were able to replace it. (Pizza ovens get hot enough.)

A good combination is a hard dodger with a means of affixing an under way and rain awning [bolt rope track plus appropriately shaped cloth]. If you go to malaria areas, the ability to add netting (especially netting treated with pyrethrins) to enclose the cockpit) was really gratifying. (Zips or velcro both work well.) Our present soft dodger has zips for a half-awning we use underway when we need shade. We like to stand up and look over the dodger, so didn't want to use the full awning, because it limits vision forward. Two long bungees secure it to our solar panel arch, so it can be easily (quickly) taken down but it offers shade as needed, and is long enough for two to sit under it.

We are able to use our cockpit awning as a rain catcher, as well, which we have found helpful in the past. A hard awning, like some catamarans have could allow you to plan in catchment, a whole cockpit cover is a large enough catchment area to do a lot of water in a short time. Use large spouts to move water faster, even though their hoses are a drag to store.

Hope this helps.

Ann

[rexposeidon]

Ann,

Lots of great info thanks!

What do you sail? Would you mind sharing a picture of your hard dodger?

Thanks,

Rich

[Hoodsail]

Never had a hard dodger/pilot hse, but my concern would be additional windage... I was out sailing solo two days ago in 15-20knots, gusting to 24k. I have a soft dodger (somewhat low profile) (see attached altho not great pic) and typical topside profile (attached dockside pic). And yet the gusts when beam on or when 20-40 degrees off the wind would cause me to heel with all sails furled. I have already compromised on windage from; furled headsail, granny bars, boom/main, dorade boxes, cabin top, winches, mast, rigging, stanchions, topsides, bimini (not installed in pic) - so do I "need" to add a permanent fixture? Admittedly I sail w/ dodger up, but windows easily open via zippers. weather gear">Foul weather gear keeps me dry, sort of, and warm here during the new england season. Issues, the latest being, fracturing the isinglass when genoa sheet got loose when furling and flogged to the point of breaking the starboard side window of the dodger...

[wingssail]

Originally Posted by Hoodsail

Never had a hard dodger/pilot hse, but my concern would be additional windage... I was out sailing solo two days ago in 15-20knots, gusting to 24k. I have a soft dodger (somewhat low profile) (see attached altho not great pic) and typical topside profile (attached dockside pic). And yet the gusts when beam on or when 20-40 degrees off the wind would cause me to heel with all sails furled. I have already compromised on windage from; furled headsail, granny bars, boom/main, dorade boxes, cabin top, winches, mast, rigging, stanchions, topsides, bimini (not installed in pic) - so do I "need" to add a permanent fixture? Admittedly I sail w/ dodger up, but windows easily open via zippers. Foul weather gear keeps me dry, sort of, and warm here during the new england season. Issues, the latest being, fracturing the isinglass when genoa sheet got loose when furling and flogged to the point of breaking the starboard side window of the dodger...

It is nice to hear from another CF member who thinks about sailing instead of primarily thinking about comfort while motoring.

But I doubt if your soft dodger is causing you to heel while motoring as much as your furled sails. Anyhow, a soft dodger can be set up/made to allow quick folding which is an advantage over hard dodgers from my point of view.

Windage and drag from all the deck mounted equipment is hard to avoid, but acres of canvas or other structures aloft do make a big difference. We've kept that foremost in our minds as long as we've had our boat. Sailing efficiency is foremost.

[Ded reckoner]

Our pilothouse sailboat is dual helm. So, we can helm either inside or outside. Our outside helm is covered with a fiberglass hardtop (on which we have solar panels) so there is protection from the sun. But, it's open to wind and rain. We are considering a furled drop down so we could have a soft dodger for the outside helm.

Particularly at night, when we're underway, we spend most time in the pilothouse. There are full instrumentation and controls inside. We have a rule the watch must open the companionway hatch and poke your head out to look around at least every 15 minutes.

I think a decision for a pilothouse is one for particular makes of boats. Most boats aren't pilothouse sailboats. A lot of people don't think about these options until they've already purchased a boat. So, the options remaining are adding either a soft or hard dodger (which would include a doghouse to make a more fully enclosed pilothouse-type enclosure of the exterior helm).

[rexposeidon]

Hoodsail thanks for the pictures!

To all who have responded my thanks. This is a deeper level of understanding than I expected.

I guess I'll just have to bum rides from people who have each different set up and decide then.

[Breaking Waves]

Originally Posted by rexposeidon

pictures

related to your question on glass - for deck saloons and (many) pilot houses you have some concern about the glass potentially breaks and down flooding the boat because those spaces are typically totally open to the interior of the boat. With a hard dodger, you (generally) don't have the same concern, because the space under the dodger is not 'interior space' and (usually) has a water-tight campaign way closure. Here you can see the 'dutch' watertight door inside our dodger (the bottom half of the door closes independently of the top half, so in weather where water is breaking over the boat you can close the bottom half and block off the companionway above the seat/transom level which still getting in and out and keeping air flow and communication going) - I like much better than washboards. We had 10mm tempered glass in our dodger - had marine engineers spec that, in theory, it could possibly break but would take rather an unlikely event to do it.



mainsheet and instruments and autopilot control (also had a remote) under the dodger - nice keeping the instruments totally dry and easy to still see from the helm

[rexposeidon]

Breaking waves,

Thanks for the details, pictures and the explanations!
Your pics are really helpful!

[ilenart]

I’ve had all three; Two previous boats, one with a pilothouse the other with a soft dodger. Current boat has a bit of a mixture; hard glass with a soft dodger, then a bimini which can be fully enclosed.

Pilothouse was great in heavy weather, but was way too hot in +30 degrees, let alone a +40 degrees where it was basically un-usable. I also found steering at night difficult, even with clear glass you lost some vision at night. if you were constantly saling in cold climates maybe ok, but in temperate or tropical locations I found it way too hot. Note this yacht was pilothouse only, did not have twin steering.

So next boat was a full canvas dodger, where you could see over the top from the helm. Solved the problems with the pilothouse, but definitely a bit cold and miserable in inclement weather.

So far the current hard glass with a soft dodger is working well, basically have the coolness and visability of a soft dodger, plus around 80% of the protection a pilot house would give you. The binimi takes about 2 minutes to fold away, so we can get rid of it for docking. Only issue is we do not have full standing headroom under the binimi, its about 3cm to short for me, wife has no problems. HR fixed this problem on the next version of my yacht; lifted the boom and mast height about 10cm. Have not used the full enclosure yet, I assume we will see how it works over the next 12 months.

Ilenart

[Kolchac]

Soft dodger, soft bimini.
In really strong wind, in open water, or on anchor, you will want to reduce sailage.
Also, when it is really hot, I remove the dodger, just to get more fresh air in a cockpit.

[wingssail]

Originally Posted by Kolchac

Soft dodger, soft bimini.
In really strong wind, in open water, or on anchor, you will want to reduce sailage.
Also, when it is really hot, I remove the dodger, just to get more fresh air in a cockpit.

Photos:
My solution for windy weather.
My solution for hot weather.
My solutions (2) for sailing in the tropics.