Hopefully posting a "Wanted to Buy" notice here is acceptable to seabreezers.
I'm hoping someone has a unused wind-vane sitting around in the shed. New options are out of my budget
WA based, but would look at freighting interstate if needed.
An Aries, Fleming, Windpilot, Navik or similar would be ideal. Open to almost anything.
I would suggest an Aries, Monitor or a Fleming in that order. The Naviks and Windpilot are a bit light in construction and Navik parts are hard to find.
www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/806552175769362/?ref=saved&referral_code=null
Thanks for the link and the input Ramona. It's got to fit on the transom of my little 30 footer.
At 300 bucks this is probably no good: www.facebook.com/commerce/listing/3040038466327159
But seriously, aren't vanes a bit old-hat? 3 grand would buy you a Raymarine Tiller Pilot setup with enough charge to go to Jaycar and get a solar panel and a charge controller. (and a warranty)...
Before everyone piles in with how good the good old days were when all we had was wind vanes and paraffin lamps hear me out.
1. Need to point your boat head to wind under motor while you put sails up? No problem. Push the button.
2.. Need to tack the boat and want to just press 2 buttons and let it do the rest? No problem.
3. Want to motor for a few hours with no wind whilst you read a book, fix a sail, have a snooze (yeah yeah keep watch). No problem.
Select to expand quoteWideawake said..
Thanks for the link and the input Ramona. It's got to fit on the transom of my little 30 footer.
Perfect.
This is my copy of a Monitor I made for use on my Currawong 30. I later had an Aries on the Currawong. When I bought the SS34 I installed the Aries on that and sold the Currawong with the Monitor replica.
This is the Aries on a Currawong.
Select to expand quoteJonE said..
At 300 bucks this is probably no good: www.facebook.com/commerce/listing/3040038466327159
But seriously, aren't vanes a bit old-hat? 3 grand would buy you a Raymarine Tiller Pilot setup with enough charge to go to Jaycar and get a solar panel and a charge controller. (and a warranty)...
Before everyone piles in with how good the good old days were when all we had was wind vanes and paraffin lamps hear me out.
1. Need to point your boat head to wind under motor while you put sails up? No problem. Push the button.
2.. Need to tack the boat and want to just press 2 buttons and let it do the rest? No problem.
3. Want to motor for a few hours with no wind whilst you read a book, fix a sail, have a snooze (yeah yeah keep watch). No problem.
That's an interesting little arrangement in the link - direct steering from windvane to tiller.
Re. tillerpilots I agree they are great while they're working. I have a couple of raymarine ST2000s. One failed recently at 3am on a rough passage shorthanded. Wasn't a great experience until we eventually got the second one working.
I know there are more expensive versions said to be great, but a windvane eliminates any potential for electrical failure. Almost inevitable on a small wet boat.
Select to expand quoteRamona said..Wideawake said..
Thanks for the link and the input Ramona. It's got to fit on the transom of my little 30 footer.
Perfect.
This is my copy of a Monitor I made for use on my Currawong 30. I later had an Aries on the Currawong. When I bought the SS34 I installed the Aries on that and sold the Currawong with the Monitor replica.
This is the Aries on a Currawong.
Looks great! Currawong 30 wouldve been well matched against my S&S30 back in the day - and still would!
I feel your pain concerning the ST 2000 failure.
I have come up with a solution to that problem.
There is a lot to say for a good strong wind vane servo. I had an Aires for years and it was great.
Now, I have a tillerpilot, a home made wind vane and sheet to tiller.
I really recommend that you put some time into getting your boat to sail sheet to tiller.
gary
The ST2000+ has inherent very deep design flaws. Unless your boat is very well balanced, the ST2000+ (and ST1000+) will eventually fail. I had 2 failures out in Bass Strait, the first of which left me hand-steering for 9 hours till I reached Refuge Cove . The second wasn't too big a problem as I had my Simrad TP22 on board as a spare. I subsequently modified my ST2000+ by fitting limit switches almost 10 years ago and it hasn't missed a beat since. My solution looks like a dog's breakfast inside compared to Gary's, but it certainly works!
Simrads are better as they have inbuilt stroke limiting and thus do not burn out like the Raymarines.
But I digress, and will STFU, so it's back to your normal wind-vane programming........
Cheers, Graeme
The Raymarine I suggest is the EV100. It's 2700 for the pack. I got one brand new in the box off gumtree for less.
you get the very clever heading sensor, a separate control head, acu, and drive unit. If you have wind on the boat you can plug that in and it does a fantastic job steering to apparent wind. It craps all over the older st4000 with the fluxgate compass.
I'm going to add the auto pilot drift, I've been in communication with pelagic & I gotta say a lot more appealing than RM etc. just my 2cents worth...
Top shelf input all. No need to STFU 
. I am still looking for a wind vane but don't mind discussing other self steering methods. The ST2000 solutions are very interesting.
Very impressive modifications there on the limiter, but I do still wonder if that will solve all the problems the ST2000 has. Sounds like it may have for Wongaga.
The drift as woko mentioned was my experience, perhaps indirectly related to the limiter issue...
Sheet to tiller is very appealing and I have had some success, but requires quite a bit of experimentation on different points of sail and sea conditions to get it reliable. Not always possible if you're on a mission and conditions change just as you were hoping to close your eyes for a minute!
The Raymarine and other autopilots all suffer the problem of proprietary teeny motors until you start paying about 6 grand
.I would recommend a nice strong reversible worm drive be installed instead of the puny motors most autopilots come with.
Select to expand quoteWideawake said..
Top shelf input all. No need to STFU . I am still looking for a wind vane but don't mind discussing other self steering methods. The ST2000 solutions are very interesting.
Very impressive modifications there on the limiter, but I do still wonder if that will solve all the problems the ST2000 has. Sounds like it may have for Wongaga.
The drift as woko mentioned was my experience, perhaps indirectly related to the limiter issue...
Sheet to tiller is very appealing and I have had some success, but requires quite a bit of experimentation on different points of sail and sea conditions to get it reliable. Not always possible if you're on a mission and conditions change just as you were hoping to close your eyes for a minute!
You could also consider building your own vane system. I have built several and while there is not much money required they are labour intensive. My YouTube channel has other vane videos.
Plenty of info online.
www.cruisersforum.com/forums/tags/windvane.html
Select to expand quoteKankama said..
The Raymarine and other autopilots all suffer the problem of proprietary teeny motors until you start paying about 6 grand
.I would recommend a nice strong reversible worm drive be installed instead of the puny motors most autopilots come with.
Actually the motors are adequately sized for normal stroking. It's the constant end-stroke stalling that kills them. Some years ago I tried sourcing some prototyped equivalents thru Alibaba and convinced a Chinese factory to supply a batch of 10. I used the Raymarine performance data to derive the required RPM and torque, and ended up with 10 slightly undersized motors for about $45! I trialed one in my ST2000+ for a while and it coped quite well, just slightly slower and a bit less thrust than the original. I sold most of them for a very low price to blokes with dead ST's, with full disclosure. I reckon they got a bargain considering new ones cost somewhere near $200! I have kept a couple for my own use if required.
If you already have an ST2000+ I reckon one of Gary's limit switch kits would provide a huge improvement in reliability and life expectancy.
Cheers, Graeme
