Stupid Wind Instrument Question?

I'm shopping for wind instruments, and I'm leaning toward Raymarine since I think I'll end up with their radar and chartplotter.

Some of their instruments come with "short arm" transducers, and some with "long arm" transducers. What are the benefits of one versus the other? What do I want? (Right now, I have a strip cut from a plastic grocery bag hanging off one shroud.)

Are you referring to the wind transducer? One would wonder if the rod that holds it out in front of the masthead comes in different lengths, now.

Mine was some sort of standard size, I presume, since there was no mention of any option on the box. I purchased the ST60 "set of three" all at the same time, just a few years ago.

Loren in PDX

Hi Mark,

This year I replaced my old wind instrument with a ST-60. The only choices I saw were the Rotovecta or masthead transducer. The Rotovecta is supposedly "prefered by powerboaters" Looks like it may not be as accurate regarding direction of the wind. I did get the masthead version and it works very well.

Regards,
Erich
E34 #264

I replaced my old Standard Horizon wind instrument with B&G. B&G comes with two optional sensor arms. The idea is to get the sensor up and away from the altered flow of air being disturbed by the sails, thus, the higher the sensor and the further forward the sensor, the better. There is an updraft (Seth? Your input here) that comes off the headsail which will affect both the direction and the velocity.
The B&G sensor arm I selected starts with an angle up and forward (about 60 degrees) and then there is a bend in the arm to send it almost directly forward. The sensor is perhaps a foot from the top of the mast, or about 3 feet from the head of the sail and then about 2 feet forward of the mast.

As an aside, I chose B&G because of the additional display data. I currently display true wind speed, apparent wind speed, true wind direction (magnetic) and apparent wind angle. There are additional wind data display options, but I have selected these four as the ones I use most often in racing.

Jim McCone
Voice of Reason E-32 Hull #134
Redondo Beach, CA

Do a little searching on the web for problems with Raymarine instruments. I found enough bitching to make me look elsewhere. That and Raymarines very crappy and ridiculously overpriced service fees when I looked into having my Raymarine chartplotter repaired. Yeah, I'm not a Raymarine fan anymore....

A buddy of mine has Navman instruments and really likes them. Other people I know like the B&G's. I am going to go for a Silva/Nexus setup when I replace the old Autohelms. Check out Silva/Nexus, very nice and Guy Stevens recommended them to me....

RT

I was shopping around the same as you last year talked to a few people in the yard with different brands in the end I ordered the moor set up from defender. I asked the guy at defender after I paid for it what the big difference was between brands, his answer was price and preferance. I did all my own install simple directions and have had no problems all year. My friend Steve with a 30 bristol has the same as me and no problems for 4yrs now.

Lots of options on brands and horror stories on all sides- only thing that works for sure is looking at the water

As far as the question about arm length, Raymarine offers a tall "cane" shaped arm and a straight arm. The straight arm should be fine- they don't seem to get a lot of disturbance from our masthead headsails.

FWIW- we just finished year 2 with our new raymarine set and love them. Easy to read, easy to program.

Chris

Whither an Autopilot question

Frank,
May I tactfully suggest that you post your inquiry in this pre-existing AP thread, or perhaps start a fresh thread on calibration of autopilots. It is an interesting topic all by itself, and I have some time invested in going in circles with ours.

http://www.ericsonyachts.org/infoexchange/showthread.php?t=1491&referrerid=28

Fewer people are likely to see your "new" question in this wind transducer thread, IMHO.

Cheers,
Loren
( Forum Moderator and occasional herder of cats...)