EV-100 wheel pilot notes

[goldenstate]

I was sailing along the other day, with my wheel-pilot driving. Suddenly the system started beeping. I bought this special loud alarm for my network for AIS wake-ups, so really it wasn't beeping, it was screaming bloody murder at me.

"No Pilot!" "No Pilot!" but of course there was a pilot, it had just been driving.

Made it home steering all by myself (I know, right? Knox Johnston stuff). Some googling showed that one possible cause was the need for a software update. I did that via the Axiom and my iphone as hotspot today. It seems to have fixed the problem.



Another thing I have recently learned / discovered figured out:

In the stand-alone EV-100 installation, the system knows what direction the boat is going, from the EV-1 compass, and what compass bearing the user wants the pilot to hold. That's all. If the wind shifts enough and one doesn't trim his sails, the system may eventually be unable to hold a course and will beep and go crazy and shut down.

With a Raymarine wind instrument at the top of the mast, all of a sudden the system has more information about the direction of the wind. With a speed input (from GPS or a paddlewheel) the system can now sort out true and apparent wind.

Once my network knew what direction the wind is blowing, it allowed me to use the 'Wind Vane' mode, were instead of steering to a compass bearing, I could input a heading relative to the direction of the wind. More like how a mechanical wind vane would work.



What's the application? Kind of gilding the lily I guess. You go below for a bit and the wind shifts. With wind-vane steering, the boat will continue blowing along. With compass bearing inputs, the boat may struggle to hold a fixed course as the sails go out of trim.

In any case, if you have the wind instrument on your network, your wheel pilot will be able to do this.

 

[Loren Beach]

Ummm.. Oh Yeah.
This sort of relates to a "problem" with electronics on boats, cars, etc. All of the companies are locked into a "Features" war where they have to provide a capability that equals or exceeds the number of capabilities of their competitor. Until next week, when a competitor ups the ante with another feature.
There is a marketing advantage in that, and to give them their due, different users do want different sets of features and outputs. On the down side the software becomes bloated and they have to constantly work out conflicts between a growing bunch of sensors, network devices, and maintenance of electrical systems with extremely low sensor voltages in boats operating in a corrosive environment.

Ideally you just request a function or a result, and the devices will intuitively provide it. This works well in fictional movies, IMHO.

Some end users are very technical and some are also engineers... the other 90% of us just muddle along hoping that the 10% of the computing power we were forced to accept in the instrument box does something useful for us.

(end of rant)

 

[goldenstate]

Secretly, the biggest upgrade is that for all of its multi-functionality, I could not find a setting on the big Axiom screen that will show me the chart, the depth, boatspeed/SOG, and the measured windspeed all at the same time. I would have to toggle back and forth between views.

Now that the pilot control head knows that the wind measurements are available it will show me the pictured view (boat speed, depth, windspeed) and then I just use Axiom as a dedicated chartplotter.

 

[Christian Williams]

Yeah, if overstressed the Ray beeps and turns itself off. Happens about 15-17 knots for me, depending on sea state. Limit to the strength of the little thing.

Wind direction input is cool. My model of wireless anemometer can't talk to the wheel pilot, but there are wireless models that can.

 

[Marlin Prowell]

I may regret asking this, but what wireless anemometer do you have? I know you have a Raymarine EV-100 wheel pilot, like I do.

 

[Christian Williams]

Regular Raymarine (formerly Tack-Tick). I chose because it doesn't require a wire to the masthead, and the readout can be moved to different locations with extra $2 plastic clips. I have clips for helm and cabin view. That's great for offshore so you can monitor wind speed from comfort. Reliability was uncertain, and although mine works fine afteer three years I did buy the WM extended warranty, on the advice of a boat mechanic. As I said somewhere else today, my model can't talk to the autopilot, whcih is OK for a wheel pilot but not for a below-decks full- scale autopilot.

 

[gadangit]

We use our autopilot in windvane mode all the time when sailing, typically offshore where slight wandering is okay. If we are close hauled ish I turn the response level to performance as trim is pretty critical. If off the wind I usually use the cruising performance level.

I believe Raymarine uses boat speed, not SOG, for their apparent wind speed calculation. So if you don't have that input, I don't think you get anything real.

 

[Slick470]

Under sail, the pilot should need to work less in wind vane mode as it will be working with the sails instead of against them if the wind shifts. This should make it easier for you to do other things and help with battery life. The AP will alarm at you if you get greater than a 30 degree shift under a specific time span. Older Ray versions had a 10 degree alarm that a lot of people found annoying.

Unfortunately the Raymarine Evo series doesn't seem to be smart enough to automatically change between apparent (AWD) for upwind and true (TWD) downwind. It will struggle a bit off the wind if you leave it in AWD. Some of the higher end pilots will do this for you.

 

[Saverio]

very nice, full of features

 

[woolamaloo]

I bought this wireless wind package from Raymarine. Even though it’s wireless, it has the interface to connect to my MFD and EV-100. It has worked practically flawlessly for three season. It also takes windage into account when I plot a course that I tell my autohelm to maintain. With the new updated Axiom software, it even calculates rhumb lines when I’m planning a tack. Windvane mode works great on long cruises where maintaining movement is almost as important as the direction I’m heading.

The way it works is that the masthead anemometer broadcasts to a small wireless handheld device that I generally hang with my binoculars in the cabin. That device can display all the wind information but it also forwards the data to the Raymarine MicroTalk Gateway that I’ve mounted on a box where I’ve coiled all the long SeaTalk cables in my lazarette. It connects to the SeaTalk network with one of the standard Raymarine connectors.

All the wind info is then available at my MFD. I never bring the handheld device out of the cabin – except when it needs a charge with its solar panel. But a nice side benefit is that I can bring it into the v-berth on a windy night and I can see wind speed and direction without leaving my bunk. No need to even power up the other instruments. Because like that, it can stand alone and all the power it’s using is from the two small built in solar panels.

I’m very pleased with it.

 

[Marlin Prowell]

@Christian Williams Since your anemometer is wireless, you can add a second receiver. It appears you could connect a Raymarine micro-talk gateway to your autopilot SeaTalkNG network to get wind information to the autopilot.

Pairing the new gateway to your existing wireless TackTick network is left as an exercise for the reader. Perhaps other forum members have experience with this.

 

[goldenstate]

I bought It also takes windage into account when I plot a course that I tell my autohelm to maintain. With the new updated Axiom software, it even calculates rhumb lines when I’m planning a tack. Windvane mode works great on long cruises where maintaining movement is almost as important as the direction I’m heading.

Interesting!

Does the MicroTalk Gateway listen for data from any other devices, or just the wind instrument? Cool that this is SeatalkNg 'Plug and Play'

Also, in terms of setting your course, do you mean that you input a waypoint and let the pilot drive toward it?

 

[Christian Williams]

mpb: Yes, good point, in fact i just realized that in this thread. Just an added device.

However, I personally -- others may have a different take -- have never considered a wheel pilot worth wind direction information. As a practical matter, I set a course and turn the WP on. Then I change course 15 minutes later and reset it to the new course (one button). If the wind were constantly shifting, a tie-in with wind direction would help. But the wind only constantly shifts in light air/no air, when auto steering has little value anyhow (because the puffs are radically different, or because in a lull the boat falls below steerageway and the rudder won't work).

If, say, I'm headed for Catalina Island, 30 miles away, I aim the boat at it. In the course of the crossing the wind generally clocks 20 degrees to the right as morning turns to afternoon. I periodically alter the set of the sails. If I had wind information, the boat would head off course, following the changing wind (the way my wind vane does). Not useful.

Most of the time, locally, I'm headed somewhere. I don't need wind information to keep the sails set correctly at the expense of course. I need to maintain course, which is what a dumb wheel pilot does best. I adjust the sail set as required.

 

[woolamaloo]

Interesting!

Does the MicroTalk Gateway listen for data from any other devices, or just the wind instrument? Cool that this is SeatalkNg 'Plug and Play'

Also, in terms of setting your course, do you mean that you input a waypoint and let the pilot drive toward it?

Tom,

The MicroTalk Gateway can listen for data from other wireless devices – just none that I would use so I have no first hand knowledge of them. You can see all the specs for them here.

The communication is also two-way. It sends the GPS and speed data from the MFD back to the handheld device. So, if you're down below, you can see that on the hand-held without going back to the helm. I find having that GPS info handy when logging a trip.

And as far as navigating to a waypoint, you absolutely can. A few years ago, I was sailing back to Cleveland from a little town directly across Lake Erie called Erieau, Ontario. I had buddy-sailed over there a few nights before. This was before I had wind instruments. We were sailing back in a 20-25 knot beam reach and my buddy and I were on different courses by over 10 degrees. We both thought we were sailing directly to Cleveland. It turned out that his wind instruments were taking the sideways motion caused by the wind into account and was altering his bearing to crab towards the destination, while my course had a big bow in it. Over the 12 hours, I probably sailed a few miles more than he did.

Since I’ve added wind instruments, I can actually see the MFD make the compensation to the autohelm for the wind speed and direction. It’s impressive computing. Of course, that means that I have more time to watch my sails to trim them to any wind shifts.

 

[Marlin Prowell]

@Christian Williams I agree with your points. Here in the San Juan Islands in Washington, it’s virtually impossible to go 30 miles in a straight line. Our travel is from waypoint to waypoint, dodging islands to get to a destination. But it’s the same considerations; I want the boat to go to the waypoint, not follow the wind shifts in a narrow pass.

When we got the boat two years ago, it had ancient electronics, some of it non-functioning, and no anemometer. I upgraded everything to current technology. I added a Garmin wireless anemometer to the boat just this fall. The anemometer connects directly to the Garmin MFD, which is connected to the Raymarine wheel pilot via NMEA 2000. Now I have an accurate idea of the wind speed, and the wheel pilot gets wind information for free.

I do like having all the interconnected electronics, so I looked to see if you integrate your anemometer with the rest of your gear.