Stern poles: ugly, functional, or both?

[Benz]

I fully sympathise with needing your boat to be visually appealing to you. I find that pretty important as well, and have luckily only had to make a few sacrifices to practicality. I have a big ugly outboard hanging off the transom, which ruins the look but allows me to eschew an inboard diesel, and I have a radar reflector at the masthead, because I want to be seen more than I want to look good.
That being said, I would never consider a pole or an arch. The accessories they carry are useless to me, and I hate antennas of any sort.
But as far as knuckling under to the general concensus here--why don't you go cruising the way you think is most appealing to you, and figure out then whether you really need a huge dinghy (if you start out with a rowing/sailing hard dink, remember how often you wish for a RIB with a rager). Of how often you think, "man, I really wish I had a radar just now," or "I wish I had a dodger" (as long as we're talking aesthetics, there's few things dumber-looking than a dodger).
It is impossible to substitute experience with public-forum opinions: as you've seen, there's endless different ways to do the same thing, each of which is right for that person. You'll be best served by doing what appeals to you the most, and modifying as you go.

[qwert]

[QUOTE=GILow;2822741]Force required to push the outboard aft increases with distance from the base of the mast in the form of f=m.tan(a) where a is the angle made between the halyard and the mast at the top and m is the mass of the outboard. In practice this means that by the time you are the same distance aft as the height of the mast you are pushing the with the same force as you would be lifting. Of course you’d probable have wet feet too. On my boat, by the time I reached the stern I’d be pushing about 0.38 x the weight (in Newtons) of my outboard.



Although the energy required to push the motor sideways may be the same as that required to lift it it is applied differently.

Its far easier to push something sideways than it is to lift the same thing vertically. I have the back problems to prove it ................

[Jammer]

Originally Posted by Benz

I fully sympathise with needing your boat to be visually appealing to you. I find that pretty important as well, and have luckily only had to make a few sacrifices to practicality. I have a big ugly outboard hanging off the transom, which ruins the look but allows me to eschew an inboard diesel, and I have a radar reflector at the masthead, because I want to be seen more than I want to look good.

::nod::

But as far as knuckling under to the general concensus here--why don't you go cruising the way you think is most appealing to you, and figure out then whether you really need a huge dinghy (if you start out with a rowing/sailing hard dink, remember how often you wish for a RIB with a rager). Of how often you think, "man, I really wish I had a radar just now," or "I wish I had a dodger" (as long as we're talking aesthetics, there's few things dumber-looking than a dodger).
It is impossible to substitute experience with public-forum opinions: as you've seen, there's endless different ways to do the same thing, each of which is right for that person. You'll be best served by doing what appeals to you the most, and modifying as you go.

Thread drift.


There is a fine line between, on the one hand, following one's own muse, and on the other, refusing to listen to good advice. There is also the ever-present risk of listening to sales people, brokers, etc., peddlers all, who will sell you whatever is in their pack whether you need it or not.



Over the course of years I have undertaken adventures in great variety, and there have been any number of things that haven't quite turned out the way I had hoped. In a few cases, looking back, I can say that I had to experience some things for myself. In others, I ended up making commitments of time and money that did not bear fruit, that could have been avoided by asking more questions and listening to the answers more closely.


So, dinghys. I may build a "Chameleon" next winter but if I do so it's going to be with my eyes wide open to the fact that it may not work out as a tender. Because my wife might not be comfortable with its stability, or because it's too much hassle to put together and take apart, or because it won't go fast enough to make it up a river and back in one day, or because it makes a poor dive platform, or because I conclude that it isn't safe in heavy seas that I would be willing to go into with a RIB, or because I end up being too lazy to row. People on CF have warned me about all those things, as a result of me asking questions in a bunch of different ways to bring out different facets of the answer.


If I do build a "Chameleon," and it does not work out, then I want to have plan B ready to go, and thought through. For example, I do not want to end up buying a sailboat where there is no room on deck for a RIB (Island Packet boats in the sort of size I'm looking at, for example, have this problem, because the foredeck is taken up by the staysail boom and a bunch of hatches and dorades), because I've figured out that an air floor is not going to work in some of the rocky areas I want to cruise.


I try this stuff on by exploring possible trips and looking at charts and satellite images of possible destinations and thinking about what it would be like, and how far it is from the anchorage to the places I would want to visit, and the prevailing wind, and what would be safe and practical.


Right now I either find a slip or anchor and swim 100 yards to shore. While that has a certain appeal of its own I'm looking forward to having a sailboat with a tender.

[Jammer]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

Jammer, we've been lifting our 15 hp outboards with the main halyard for many years. We bring the dink alongside amidships, I shackle the lifting sling (that i made from nylon webbing) on to the halyard, we winch it up about a foot and then I walk it back to the stern and as I aim it over a mount, Ann lowers it a few inches and it sets into place. Takes a couple of minutes, uses no equipment not already in place and I can still manage it at 81. Reversing the process to mount it on the dink... which can be a bit adventurous if a big chop is running... is pretty easy as well. Lift it off the mount, walk back to where it hangs docilely, climb down into the boat and set it on the transom.

Been doing this since 1985, and haven't dropped it yet!

Thanks for that, Jim, I've wondered whether that would be practical and up until now haven't seen any reports of people trying it.

[RaymondR]

I am in the process of moving a radar down from the mast onto a stern pole. The main reason is that I want to move the display to the helm position and do not want to add another 20' of cables. The radar is a Furuno and I am interested to see whether it is of much use in coastal cruising with a view as to whether I may want to upgrade it to one which will display on my MFD.

I have put a hinge in the pole to allow access to the radar mounting from deck level and will also be installing an outboard hoist some time in the future - pretty well mandatory if you want to be able to place or remove an outboard by yourself only.

I tend to the opinion that the elegance of a sail boat is more marred by the great lump of a radar antenna up the mast than it is by having it on a mast at the stern.

[GILow]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

You’re forgetting that the mast height is much longer than the distance to the stern..

Ummm. No. I didn’t.

Read the bit about wet feet and figure it out from there. It ain’t rocket science.

[Jim Cate]

Originally Posted by GILow

Ummm. No. I didn’t.

Read the bit about wet feet and figure it out from there. It ain’t rocket science.

Putting some numbers to it:

Halyard block is ~65 feet up from waterline, so about 64 feet above the o/b on the dink.

The storage mount is ~22 feet aft of the mast and about 7 feet above the waterline. It works out that if Ann raises it about two feet straight up with the halyard winch (easy peasy) and I walk it back, it is at the right height to set down on the mount.

Not hard to do... I've done it on my own on our previous boat, but only when it is pretty flat water.

Jim

[GILow]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

Putting some numbers to it:



Halyard block is ~65 feet up from waterline, so about 64 feet above the o/b on the dink.



The storage mount is ~22 feet aft of the mast and about 7 feet above the waterline. It works out that if Ann raises it about two feet straight up with the halyard winch (easy peasy) and I walk it back, it is at the right height to set down on the mount.



Not hard to do... I've done it on my own on our previous boat, but only when it is pretty flat water.



Jim

Yep, good mechanics make for light work. Just ask the Ancient Egyptians who did a lot of things that modern humans have forgotten how to do and thus think of their achievements as super human or aided by martians.

As for the maths of the whole thing, I feel I can eliminate the Tan function from the equation and convert to a simple formula based on the distance from the mast base, but the equation is eluding me at the moment. I’ve been stuck in the land of inductive proofs for the last few weeks and it has buggered my trig. It will come to me. I THINK it may be non linear though. Not sure.

[Brewgyver]

If you view enough pictures of 30ish foot boats online, you might notice a pattern. A pretty good percentage of them either don't have radar, or they have a stern mounted radar mast.
Try searching yachtworld and sailboatlistings for Catalina 30s, for example. Hard to find one with radar on the main mast, because it's practically impossible to install on the mast without removing the mast. In most cases it costs much less to install a radar mast at the stern.
Now that there are wireless radomes available, like the Raymarine Quantum, we might see more smaller boats adding radar on the mast, as they only require a power cable, which may be fished up through an existing conduit, unlike the fatter radar cable.

BTW, I think you mean PERceived wisdom...

[Stu Jackson]

We bought this dinghy lift from Garhauer decades ago. In order to make room in the aft cabin for our trip up the coast from SF to BC, I just put it up. It's stayed up since. Not a bad "hand hold" either. It visually disappears after a while. Still has a great finish on it.

[Kerryf]

As far as I am concerned the main reason for having radar, AIS and other antennas on a stern pole is that if the rig goes over the side you dont lose comms.

[barnakiel]

You have to place that hardware somewhere so the post is one solution. Whether it is ugly or not depends on the design and on your taste.


b.

[Suijin]

Bob Perry started a thread over at Sailing Anarchy a few years ago. He posted a picture of three Valiants rafted up, from the stern, all of them having a huge amount of gear hanging off the back. His thread title was “Not what I had in mind” lol.

If you’re going long distance long term cruising in a 40’ boat it’s just a fact of life that your stern is going to get cluttered with ugly stuff. I have a wind vane, outboard, grill, anchor, and four fenders and two solar panels above the bimini along with a forest of antennas.

The fact of the matter is an arch is a very effective way of managing a lot of this stuff. I considered adding one during my last refit but the cost put me off. I would be able to design in the panels, the bimini, antennas, motor lift and a few other things no doubt.

As it stands my 8 hp two stroke Yammie sits on the rail and I have no lift. I can muscle it to the side deck fairly easily. The issue is getting it into the dinghy. I need two arms to lift it off the deck and down into the dinghy. In any sort of chop thT becomes a dicey proposition and after I almost went over backwards with it on my chest, the next day I went out and bought a 2.5 hp Yammie four stroke. I love it. I can lift it easily with one arm, no mixing gas, no fumes, great mileage (although the tank is the size of a squirrel bladder), starts first pull without fail. I store it standing in a cockpit locker. The 8 hp only comes off the rail when it’s convenient and for long distance work.

[svspirited]

A 2 stroke 15hp Yamaha only weighs about 38kg, a bit too heavy to heave up from the dink but certainly manageable once on deck. A 4-stroke would make that pretty much impossible. If you have the room consider a set of chocks between the main and head sail or if you end up with an arch a set of davits and secure it there and just leave the motor attached. It makes life so much easier. For most shorter passages leaving it on the davits is fine. If you are traveling for a longer period and are not confident with the forecast accuracy stow the dink on the deck and the outboard below if you can.

Originally Posted by Jammer

I want to be a fan of smaller outboards that I can lift with one hand (e.g. 3hp), but the received wisdom is that I am a fool in this regard and need to get with the times and think in terms of a 15 hp Enduro.

[JPA Cate]

Originally Posted by Kerryf

As far as I am concerned the main reason for having radar, AIS and other antennas on a stern pole is that if the rig goes over the side you dont lose comms.

For emergency comms following being dismasted, Jim ran a plain wire, like for household wiring, from the antenna wire up to the bow pulpit. It worked on 40 m. Allowed us comms to arrange an escort from friends into the marina, because, of course, you no longer have nav lights, unless you carry kero ones, and we didn't. I would think that if the down side in a knockdown situation were the pole side, you'd lose what got submerged, but don't know for sure. Sorry, don't know what he used (if anything) for VHF, maybe the handheld.

Ann