Autopilot

One of the most important pieces of equipment for a double-handed crew sailing long distances is some kind of self-steering system.  This allows one person to make adjustments to the sails, grab something to eat, or just relax while the other person is off-watch.  The self-steering drives the boat on a set course relative to the wind or the compass, and it makes rudder adjustments as needed to maintain the course.  It’s like having an extra crew member that will steer and, unlike certain crewmembers, never complain about how hungry or how tired he/she is…

Madrone has an electronic autopilot.  A computer monitors the average course, and a strong electric motor attached to the steering quadrant moves the rudder to when the boat sails off course.  While we often steer by hand near land or coming into a harbor, while on the ocean the autopilot steers the boat about 99% of the time. It’s a critical safety feature for the boat.

Madrone’s autopilot was originally installed in 1996 during the original commissioning.  After 20+ years, it still worked well nearly all of the time.  Unfortunately, “nearly” is not a good trait for a critical safety system.  When the autopilot would fail, it would make an almost inaudible beep and then switch itself off.  Often, the first sign we would have is that the boat would start to sail in a circle.  That’s usually no problem in settled weather, but it can be dangerous in large seas and strong wind.  Since the autopilot is so important to us, we decided to replace our autopilot with a new one and keep the original as a spare, in the unlikely event that our new one should develop a problem or stop working.

 

Installation of the new autopilot was a big job and included disassembling and removing the old autopilot unit & stowing it safely, running new wiring through the boat (never an easy task!), installing the new autopilot unit (under the aft berth and behind the nav station), and installing the new control panel.

 

 

The new autopilot system is more modern, and it’s better in just about every way – it steers a tighter course, it compensates better for wave action on the boat, and it even uses less power to drive the rudder.  All in all, it’s a good upgrade, and we’re very pleased.

P.S. For the fellow boat nerds out there, our system is a Raymarine EV-400 with P70s controller and Type 2 linear drive….