Autopilot options

[Jordan]

Hello all. So we're doing our best to go out sailing as often as possible. And now, it's time for some instruments. For now, the hawkeye depth sounder will work, even though I'm not a huge fan of the uber temporary install we have. So next is a wind speed indicator and an autopilot. I found I was focusing too much on the compass bearing instead of the wind at first, and then I couldn't see the passive indicator from the wheel with the bimini up, and the only hint I had was when the sails started luffing. Now, I know a good chunk of this is practice, so I'm not worried, but it did highlight a few things. A wind vane is definitely something I want, especially for longer passages. The idea of it just appeals to my romantic side, and the lack of electricity usage appeals to the idea of simplicity. But that's not the kind of sailing I'm going to be doing right now. It's around coastal around Florida, until we start venturing further. Now, based on some calculations, specs, and comments here, I don't want to do a wheel drive unit, as I don't think it would be anything but temporary, and for the cost, it's only a bit more to install a beefier one under the cockpit. I am right at the first phase of beginning to install instruments (I don't count the depth sounder for some reason), so if it turns out to be easier to stick with all the same brand, now would be the time to pick that.

So what do you have for self-steering? Weaknesses? Strengths? What kind of sailing do you do? Recommendations? We're thinking within a year to jump to the islands, and start cruising out way South. There is a lot of information out there, and real hard to find decent used things.

[SVJourney]

#1  DON'T buy used if going off shore.  Again, you are not doing yourself any favors buying worn out gear, especially electronics.  Again, I have a bias against this.   

Budget = CPT wheel pilot.  Simple, robust, powerful, low power requirement. It does nothing more than heading hold and does not interface with anything else.   Small company with excellent customer service that will have your back wherever you are in the world.  ~$2100 and installs in 2 hours.  We used this pilot all the way across the Pacific.  http://www.cptautopilot.com

Spendy:  Ask PeteW about his hydraulic pilot.  Sweeeet set up he designed and built out of components.

Uber spendy:  Raymariine linear drive.  Details here: https://pearson365.com/forum/index.php?topic=1882.0

A wind steering system is problematic on these boats.  It can be done, Evening Ebb had a sweet secondary rudder system on his boat.  But remember that you lose everything else you could hang over the transom like dingy davits and solar panels.

[stbtack1]

Just my 2 cents. Wayne has many thousands of miles of experience and I would rate his advice as top notch.  I had not previously seen the cpt system but love the simplicity and power. I had a ray marine wheel pilot and considered it useless, mainly because of lack of power. I upgraded to a ray marine electric linear drive and absolutely love the functions but acknowledge this is not the system of choice for offshore passages as a long term cruiser. For coastal sailing or occasional passages the ray marine system is awesome. It will sail by course or wind direction and tack and gybe  bringing the boat to close to the same wind angle on opposite tacks with a touch of a button. For the way I sail it is perfect and the price point is easy on the wallet.  On the other hand if I were crossing oceans my priorities would be quite different and would very likely prefer the system Wayne settled on.  In that world my greatest concern would be some relief from hand steering for prolonged periods in stormy conditions and a robust simple system.  I just do not trust the ray marine system in that scenario. System failure at the same time you are exhausted is not a good combination.  Ray marine does offer a hydraulic upgrade but when you enter that space I would look at brands that have a more robust reputation.

[Jordan]

Wow. I'm liking that CPT wheel pilot. The simplicity of it is something I like. I discussed it a bit with Xtine, and we discussed any concerns she had. She did have some concerns. After we discussed a bit more, it turned out that she thought the autopilot was the device you put way points in. When I explained that was more of the function of a chart plotter, she was disappointed that it would be able to execute turns for us. After we ran through a couple of scenarios verbally, I explained that with every turn, we'd need to trim the sails, and what we would do is turn off auto pilot, make the turn, engage the autopilot, and trim the sails. We discussed other sailing videos we've seen. Delos, Ruby Rose, and FollowTheBoat (mostly because Ruby Rose and FTB are very skilled sailors) on passages when they used it, and she realized they did the same thing. I've got a few more things to research about this, but damn I like it. And the fact that Journey* had one instantly makes me feel really good about it. I can't believe that I read people didn't have issues with it when it got swamped, but who knows.

*Journey (and GalleyWenchTales) have very quickly become one of my go-to spots when I need info on what it's like doing the kind of cruising we're thinking of doing. Wayne and Dana's suggestions carry a lot of weight with the two of Us.

[Sandy]

I have a RM wheel pilot but consider it complete junk
When the drive was working the command electronics module and fluxgate worked ok and would probably suit my purposes,
I was thinking if I could get my head around the connections I could replace the wheel pilot with an electric or hydraulic linear actuator< I think RM offer a kit for that
well once I understood how to connect and disconnect the ram (I just dont get how thats done)
Looking at the job they did of the ST4000 a well chosen ram for industrial application would probably be superior to the RM anyway, and a darn sight cheaper
All I want to do is set a course, hold the heading and let her go, nothing fancy.

When you think a 'heading hold' feature is within the electronics the tiller steer offers (and my god a look inside tells you these are just awful),
but at 1/6th the power and 1/20th the price, and just about fits in a matchbox, fluxgate included
quite outside of the quality of rams and fitment etc, makes you wonder where the money goes

Not impossible to see that if you took the fluxgate out of the circuit and installed a windvane with its own angular sensor you could have a version of windsteer,
the difference being instead of steering a magnetic course you would be steering to maximise speed from sail efficiency on a course set by wind direction
of course its a bit wasteful of electric power but it saves on infamous windsteer complications, just an idea

[Jordan]

Did you check out that CPT? I was thinking the same thing about wheel autopilots. After I saw that it has a separate motor box, a seemingly easy install, and it was around $1800, that's the direction I'm definitely thinking about going.

[Sandy]

Jordan: Dont know if you are talking to me or not.

I have checked them out before, but I want to get out of it for less than that, actually kind of need to.
So periodically Im looking out for robust linear drives, either electric or electric/hydraulic
If I cant make the existing RM Command Module from the ST4000 work,
... my next direction would be to fashion another control unit out of tiller drive electronics, and set it in epoxy for protection
It has all the control functions I need, I just need to have around 600lbs thrust linear drive with enough scope

[Jordan]

@Zulu, yeah that was directed at you. That makes sense. I suppose I have the benefit of needing everything, so there is nothing that things have to work with. I am thinking about getting that Raymarine I70s system with an anemometer and a thru hull depth speed indicator. At that point, I might not worry about replacing the engine panel, and just get a NMEA 2000 adapter, and use that display to show temp and RPM.

[Dale Tanski]

For what it is worth...
One mans opinion...
2-1/2 cents worth...

Raymarine is getting better, they had to.  One of their bigger problems with the boating community was their equipment's inability to directly connect to others NEMA 2000 equipment without a $900 "adaptor" black box.  In the world of NEMA 2000 where everyone elses units plugged and played with each other (that was one of the reasons for a common backbone) theirs would not.  This meant that if you had a year old Simrad NEMA 2000 radar, and you just bought a new RM chart plotter, the plotter would not connect without the magic box.  Hell, even the end connectors on the cable system were different, Ray's were different everybody elses were the same. 

That was only a couple of years back. I suspect that their loss in market prompted them to change so they did.  We sell Raymarine, Simrad, B&G, Ockam, Lowrance, Vakaros, Racegeek, Garmin, Velocitek, Furuno, Clipper and more, so integrating them together is important.  For the most part the technology in the typical sailing instruments hasn't changed much.  The method of display, they pretty much all use LCD screens now, is the biggest advancement. In the race boat instruments there have been big changes and they have all been driven by small startup companies.  The change here (race instruments) has been fantastic.

Look at as many manufactures as you can. Unfortunately, the boat shows have been canceled. West Marine instruments are relabeled Raymarine.  Read, look and learn. if you see something you are interested in on someone elses boat, ask them what they think of them. 

One last thing, out of all the warranty issues we see, Ray leads the list. Out of all the 2nd problems issues, its is Ray again.

Dale

[Jordan]

That's a good point Dale. Here I am talking about the benefits of not having an existing NMEA backbone (or instruments to connect to it with the exception of my Victron Battery Monitor and inverter/charger, and thinking about going with the one brand that would need additional stuff to convert from SeaTalkNG to NMEA2000.