auto pilot which one

[admirals barge]

hi all
i want to install an auto pilot on my 74 35 II. there are a variety available. i would like your opinion of the auto pilot you have on board your 35. make and model, ease of installation, ease of use, would you buy the same one again or a different one. what you like and dislike about it. hopefully this will narrow down my choices.....

thanks for taking the time to respond.
happy sailing
greg
74 35II # 325

 

[Loren Beach]

Our 34 footer (aprox. 11K displ.) came with no AP. I bought and installed one right away, and somehow, a decade has slipped by...

I put in an Autohelm A4000s. I would go with one again --- partly because I still do not have the $$$$ to install a below-deck AP.

You can still buy the current iteration of my AP for around $800. to $900.
Considering that I once spent about $900., the adjusted cost has dropped considerably.

Ours did need a pc board replaced in the control unit a couple years ago for $275. No other expenses. The belt ("hidden" inside the ring on the wheel) has never needed changing.

The AP is easily the most important piece of electronics on the boat, right after the DS !


Best,
Loren in PDX
O-34 Fresh Air

 

[u079721]

Raymarine ST4000

Our E-38 came with the ST4000 unit, the type with the ring mounted on the wheel rather than the belt for a drive.

Turns out that the 38 is close to being too heavy for this unit, so my criticism may be unfair, but I never was satisified with it. Under sail it seemed overwhelmed, but it could cope under power.

We had to have the control head replaced once, but even so it used to suffer from what we called "excursions" when it would just decide to turn the boat 90 degrees. Not too much of a problem in the open lake, but you sure couldn't trust it in a channel.

And when we used a route on the GPS, with the GPS controlling the pilot (my standard method of crossing Lake Huron) the unit would usually not turn in the correct direction when switching from one point to the next. We had to power down the unit and reboot it to get it to track on the new waypoint. All of which may just mean that we had a hidden glitch in our unit, but most of the time it worked just fine, so short of having the unit replaced again I didn't know what to ask the service department.

My friends with the below deck ST6000 units have nothing but good things to say about them, but that is a LOT more money. In the thousand dollar range of the ST4000 I wouldn't know what to suggest, but for what it's worth, based on our experience I wouldn't buy another ST4000.

 

[Loren Beach]

Is this thread Veering Off Course?

Hi Steve,
On our prior boat, we found that having the 12 volt power supply wiring to the AP (an old Navico tillerpilot) within an inch of the VHF coax would often cause a hard right turn when the mike was keyed to make a call...
:eek:
Quite Exciting in a narrow river channel until I figured out the answer...


Loren

 

[stbdtack]

On my E38 I have a Raymarine S1G with a 6000 head and a type 1 ram. It will steer through anything I have tried so far. Even downwind with big steep rollers it will steer as well as any live helmsman. The boat might still broach with the gusts(and too much sail) but the pilot will bring it back around and be steering the correct course in less time than I could do it. The AST technology learns the boats characteristics as it steers.
I'm amazed at the difference the gyro makes in steering response. Its instant the second the boat veers 1/2 a degree.

The downside is that it's pretty spendy and an involved install. Had to lay out the geometry and fabricate a sturdy mount for the ram. Since there is no room for a rudder post tiller arm, I had to modify the steering quadrant to attach the drive pin from the ram.

A lot of cash and work but this thing steers better than any unit I have used on any boat. I dont mean to sound like a Raymarine salesman, I know that Simrad and others make units that perform as well but I wanted to interface with all my other Raymarine Electronics. I will snap some pics if anyone is interested.

 

[evm]

We use a ST4000 on out boat and have had to replace the pc board once much like Loren. The unit does a good enough job for our E39 both under sail and power. For the bucks it cannot be beat.

If I were going to go half way around the world I would upgrade to an underdeck unit with the gyro. This is for 2 reasons. First is the ST4000 is at its limits displacement wise so you should expect the failure rate to go up. Second the gyro updates course 8 times a second (the fluxgate compass updates only once a second) which gives you much improved tracking as well as MARPA on your Radar. (Oh how I covet a gyro)

I have heard of people who have their main below decks pilot and a ST4000 backup. Just to get them over a failure.

Regarding using GPS provided waypoints to the pilot....I do not allow myself to trust the electronics enough to put this in effect. My GPS has the route in it, the PC is tracking us on the ENC display and I manually adjust the pilot to the new heading.

I'm not saying that it is not trustworthy or that anyone should do as I do. Just that I am a computer geek and I don't trust electronics too much. I do keep a paper chart track.

Regards, Ethan

 

[u079721]

Loren,

I was aware of the effect of radio trasmissions on autopilots, and was frustrated that I could never correlate our "excursions" with anything that we seemed to be doing.

And Ethan - as for the desirabiltiy of interfacing your GPS with your autopilot, I can think of few topics around the yacht club that tend to get people more worked up. (Even worse than which anchor is best.)

When I am crossing Lake Huron at night and have nothing to refer to except the GPS, I figure I am trusting it, so I might as well let it steer the boat as well. It saves a lot of effort trying to get the cross track error down by diddling with the exact magnetic heading on the autopilot. And if it steers poorly, it will show up in the cross track error anyway. BUT, I am in the cockpit all the time, never use the autopilot if we are close to anything hard (boats or land), check the cross track error every ten minutes, and every half hour I plot my position on the chart below and cross check the main GPS with the back up and the LORAN to see that they all agree.

With all those precautions I still have friends who say what I am doing is unsafe. I figure the real issue - once the autopilot is engaged - is how good a lookout you keep, and how well you monitor your position, whether you do it strictly by chart position or by cross track error.

Boat US has those insurance stories they publish about how things go wrong on the water. And a few months back one of them was a grounding that was caused by a boat motoring along on the intracoastal under AP when their AP took it's own "excursion" 90 degrees right into the shore before anyone could get to the helm. Having learned not to trust my own AP, I can't imagine ever trusting an AP in a narrow channel or river. But lots of folks do it.

 

[evm]

SNIP
And Ethan - as for the desirabiltiy of interfacing your GPS with your autopilot, I can think of few topics around the yacht club that tend to get people more worked up. (Even worse than which anchor is best.)
SNIP

I never knew that it gets much talk. Just expressing my own thoughts (and I know you know that)

You hit it square on the head. You must mantain a watch that can respond in the available time.

Regards

 

[Guy Stevens]

Other opinion

I have had a couple of Autohelm / Raytheon autopilots on a variety of boats. They are OK for casual weekend sailing, for offshore or a heavly used boat, they just don't stand up. Even the ST6000 below decks pilots are not built very well, plastic planitary gears and a slow week motor.

If you are going to be doing any offshore work get a pilot that you can depend on.

Nexus makes a great pilot, as Does B&G and WH. Having installed and been bunkmates with all of them offshore, (and even more times having to hand steer after a failed Raytheon or Autohelm unit) my favorite is probably the Nexus, although the B&G was a good unit. WH simple and robust but not much in the way of interfacing with other insturments, and quite a handfull to get tuned in and working correctly. A hydraulic ram and a good motor that allows the pilot to rapidly adjust the rudder are needed for serious offshore work.

Interfacing with the GPS, on ocean crossings is handy, inshore; well you had better be at the helm to take over when things go pear shaped. They will either because of the pilot, or the more common entering of the waypoint wrong. My favorite on this was being onboard a boat once that started following a scrap metal barge that was going by...

Guy

 

[Ray Rhode]

Greg,

I have an ST6000 with the below deck linear drive. Fortunately the PO have installed an Autohelm 4000 so I was able to just swap out the drive. From the looks of the installation it may not be a DIY project depending on you access to the rudder post.

As for performance, it is very satisfactory. On a Gulf crossing to Clearwater we had 20 to 25 knots on the port quarter with a pretty good following sea. We tried hand steering figuring that the AP could not keep up. Finally got tired and turned it over the the ST6000. After about a minute or two it settled down and we were able to relax.

Ray Rhode
S/Y Journey
E35-III, #189

 

[Chris Miller]

My favorite on this was being onboard a boat once that started following a scrap metal barge that was going by...

Guy

I guess the boat thought the barge was well stacked?
I find that our boat has a tendency to follow boats with bikini clad crew members on it's way out of the harbor--- but the autopilot is never engaged...

We use an ST4000 on the Chesapeake, which is perfect--- but I agree that I'd never go offshore with it. We use it mostly when the motor is on, or in very light air... I prefer people at the helm in a good breeze.
Chris

 

[ted_reshetiloff]

I have a Simrad WP32 on my 89' E 38. It came with the boat and did not work properly when I got it. Sent back to Simrad, spent 400 bucks to get it working right. Had to send it back 2 times to get it right. I told the tech I thought it was the fluxgate compass as everything was working it just would not stay on course and would not allow me to calibrate. The second time around they replaced the compass and it has worked fine. I tend to push my boats pretty hard and have found this unit is not to good downwind in big seas. I get the feeling like it is a bit undersized for the boat. Would rather have a B&G like mentioned above but for now this one will do. When we get ready for the offshore stuff up to New England or down to the tropics this is without a doubt not the unit I will have. For the money though its perfect for Chesapeake bay.

 

[soup1438]

I'm wondering, now...

What are the advantages/disadvantages of the electronic variety versus the wind vane based self-steering units?

I recognize that the biggest difference is that the vanes will adjust to keep the wind at a specific angle and so a shifting wind will force a diversion whilst the electronic variety will maintain a specific course versus the compass (or, perhaps, the GPS?) which won't take the wind into consideration (which can confuse things if the wind shifts to the "wrong" location and you're running single-handed).

What are the other pros and cons?

 

[Ray Rhode]

The other big limitation on the use of a wind vane is their inability to help when going down wind because of the reduced apparent wind velocity. Their big advantage is no DC power is required.

My ST6000 will sail to a compass heading, GPS course, and when connected to my Standard Horizon wind instrument will also sail to apparent wind. It will also warn you of a significant wind shift so you don't go off blindly following the wind. It also does a pretty good job down wind as long as boat speed stays up.


Ray Rhode
S/Y Journey
E35-III, #189

 

[boatboy]

Windvanes

I'm a big fan of mechanical windvane systems and have been using a Sailomat for many years -- both on our current Ericson 39 and my previous Morgan 32. Of course their strengths shine most brightly on longer passages. For the most part I have found that if there is enough wind to sail, there is also enough to make the windvane do it's thing. Keep in mind that for light air work it is important that your steering system be fairly low in friction. Of course some windvane systems do better than others on downwind courses. The Sailomat has a unique vane-to-oar-ratio adjuster that helps greatly in this area.

We have also had good success in driving the input side of the system with a small, cheap tiller pilot instead of the air vane. This works well when it is more important to steer an exact compass course or when the wind shuts off and you need to motor. Since in this application you put virtually no load on the tiller pilot, you have very low battery draw and it's lifespan should be much longer.

As an added bonus, a number of the windvane systems can be converted to emergency rudder duty. That's certainly a nice capability to have in your back pocket.

Attached is a photo of "Sal" doing his steering thing while going down the coast on a recent trip. You can also see how greatly concerned I am about it's performance while sailing dead downwind in maybe 9-10 knots of true wind speed.

 

[dwigle]

I have to agree with Greg, windvanes are the way to go, zero power draw, QUIET, and very reliable. We brought our Monitor over from our old boat and have had good luck on all points of sail in various winds from San Francisco to Catalina.
We also have an ST 4000 the previous owner installed which works ok for the bay and while motoring in flat seas.
I really enjoy having both.

Don Wigle
Wiggle Room
E 38 #8
Pt. Richmond, CA

 

[Graham Cole]

pilots

If anyone is getting erratic steering from st4000 MK.2 wheel pilots theyshould consider getting the rudder reference transducer that is now included with the units. Really cleans up course keeping, particularly on fin/ spade boats with faster steering ratios. I have installed 14 of these this year and quite a few linears as well. Have found the simrad/ navico wheelpilot to be a dumpster candidate. Just finished a Choate 41 and didn't think the 4000 would be adequate but it steered just fine. Same with an islander 36 and an E29. S1G linear worked great on a '85 Hunter 40, a Dufour 35 classic and a CS 40. Reason for being a Raymarine booster? Less callbacks than others. Few problems and easy to use. Can't make a living on warranty !

 

[evm]

Looking for a good deal on a rudder reference

My ST4000 mk2 dithers back and forth through about 10 or 20 degrees but does average quite accuratly. this is most noticable under power on the river where you can see the wake. Offshore in 10' waves and 20 kt winds doing 8 to 11 kt under sail the dither is not noticable. the wind and wave move the boat offcourse more than the dither.

By messing with the pilot adjustments I was able to reduce the dither from the initial excessive amount.

The rudder reference looks nice. this should allow the pilot to figure out how the boat handles and how much correction is needed.

--Ethan

 

[Graham Cole]

The rudder ref. unit allows the pilot to apply some 'counter rudder' and drastically reduces hunting by allowing a huge reduction in drive activity. The most common complaint is an ever increasing course oscillation followed by a large, radical turn. If your pilot doesnt have the ref. unit I would reccommend you investigate it. The wheel will be almost motionless on a steady course when running. The 4000+ is a great reliable pilot when properly installed and initialized. It is prone to failure due to being not quite centered on the wheel, forcing the wheel drive into an eccentric motion. If you are an offshore guy, by all means buck up for the linear. My Dufour 35 customer had an uneventful Vancouver- Alaska trip with his 6000+ type1 linear, and he departed the day after I installed it!

 

[wurzner]

E32 with WP30

I have to agree with the folks regarding windvanes as well, I would NEVER let any autopilot drive down wind in heavy seas, regardless of above or below deck due to the albeit remote chance they get a stray current. That being said, my Simrad WP is fine for what I use it for, coastal cruising in light to moderate winds and not down wind unless the winds are very light and I'm flying a spinnaker to balance things out (<7 knots) AND someone is close to the helm to disengage if needed. The WP is a clean installation and has perfomred well over the last 1500 miles or during the last year and a half. Depending on what you plan on doing, it's a relatively inexpensive unit that is easily installed and NMEA compatable. For any thing serious though, I would give it the time of day. I would over spec an autopilot unless you have a sufficient boat budget, and recommend the WP32 for light duty. If you do anything beyond that, stay clear of it.

shaun