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The Nav Station Is Obsolete, Let's Build a Bar!

4K views 21 replies 15 participants last post by  JonEisberg 
#1 ·
In the old days, we needed a protected area where we could store and view our paper charts without fear of the weather making them useless. In today's world, electronics rule.

Yes, the nav station is dead.

Now we can mount a sail pod at the helm with a chart plotter, depth, wind, speed and whatever gauges you want. And you can have your VHF right there at your side to hail whoever you want.
Wanna blow your mind?

Yes, the nav station is dead. But don't fret! There's hope!

Your nav station is just begging to come into the 21st Century. What better place to create your own personal bar? And what better place than right by the companionway.

What's your poison?
 
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#2 ·
The smaller display in that video (on the right) has an MSRP of about $5700. That's almost as much as I paid for my boat.
 
#3 ·
Some boats with the full plastic and sunbrella enclosures have been very sucessful at utilising the cockpit as a permanent additional room.
So, sure the nav station and the helm station can be combined.
Cockpit tables have electrical outlets for laptops for additional info sources.
The library of books needed are now on computer, including the requiremens to have a copy of ColRegs for instance... All on computer.

The space given to the nav station below has been reduced and reduced and now on many new boats its multi function with a saloon sofa. Anyway its become the electrical switch board and entertainment center.
The other night a friend was describing how he has connected he tv on the saloon wall to the PC and uses a wireless keyboard and mouse to do his nav from the lounge instead of the nav station.

So yes, the nav station can become a bar, or added space, if the elements are moved to better locations.

Every other walk of life is modernising, why shouldnt boats. Inner city trendy appartments dont have kitchens any more but areas integrated with the living room where one can cook.... My house doesnt have a laundry anymore... The clothes washer/dryer is in the kitchen under benches...

A creative mind can do a lot for the livability of a boat. :)
 
#4 ·
Ha....our helm Navopds look exactly like the picture.

I do use our nav station frequenyly. It always has the chart of the area out when we are traveling and we mark position evey half hour. I have a tridata repeater as well as all my electrical panel and VHF is nearby. Our stations "desk" is also great for storage for many items.lso where I sit when I want to use the laptop vs the IPad.

Dave
 
#5 ·
While I almost never use the Nav Station while underway, I use it nearly every morning when cruising. A cup of coffee and my Ipad, checking weather, harbor/marina data, even just catching up on email. Sure, its more of a desk than a navigation necessity. However, I will also enter routing into the chartplotter at the nav station and it will transfer up above as we leave later in the morning.

And, I most certainly have paper chart books that I reference there as well. Usually for planning, more than enroute nav these days.
 
#6 ·
Ha.
My Nav station:


Note the cabinet to the left of it? That's the liquor cabinet - Holds 15 bottles securrely in round slots.

Here's the cabinet - note the front holds a first aid kit - convenient to the booze.


Now, as to the helm - yeah I got some work to do there. I'm bouncing back and forth between a nice curved teak 'box' with my 'stuff' face mounted - or a navpod box.
I want to keep the teak look and style that goes with the wheel.



Anyway, that's a whole thread of my own eventually.
 
#9 ·
I got distracted on my original post and left out a comment for Julie -

Julie, it's absolutely true what you say about the electronic stuff taking over, but not the need for an adequate nav station below decks.

The stuff at the helm is for where you are now and what you are doing now; planning the trip still needs a layout where you can sip wine/coffee etc.. and plot the courses with way points and such.

If you build it out at the helm only you have to do all that plotting at the helm, not so comfy nor nice as sitting below and doing it with your partner over some goodies.

Check out the thread about iPod's and chartplotters, there are lots of good tools out there now that let you use them remotely from below decks like my Raymarine e7d does (not in the picture, that's the 'as bought' view of my helm.

And always carry paper charts, they make nice conversation pieces (and backups).
 
#10 ·
If I wanted to watch TV I would stay at home- toooo many screens. Have a friend who has all these screens on his Tarten - I have to keep reminding him to LOOK UP and around ! He keeps staring at his collection of screens. There's the real world here - not a TV screen.

Me - have a small screen showing depth, speed!
 
#11 ·
But this is just changing some old habits so you can create new habits. All that sitting at the laptop with a cuppa in the AM, charting your course, can be done at the settee. But when it's time to entertain, it's nice to have everything at your disposal, just inside the companionway. "And the drinks will flow..." ;)

Maybe I can find room for an icemaker too! :D
 
#12 ·
We have the ice maker too. I'm guaranteeing you'll never go back, if you get one. Almost take it for granted now. Can hardly remember what it was like to lug bags to the boat. Physically impossible to use all the ice and I've had as many as 14 aboard once.

As far as old habits, there might be some of that. However, our settee is likely to be set up for breakfast when I'm planning, or surrounded by guests, will I sit at the nav station and plan. The table heights are also slightly different, making it easier for me to write or plot at the nav table than the settee table.
 
#13 ·
Here's a picture that speaks more than a thousand words, IMHO...

This was the "Nav Station" aboard the yacht AEGEAN, which was driven straight into one of the Coronado Islands in last fall's Newport-Ensenada race, resulting in the deaths of all 4 aboard...



Looks like the practice of "navigating" aboard that boat was strictly a matter of pushing buttons and scrolling a cursor at the helm...
 
#14 ·
My boat is barely set up for even day-sailing. However, I find that upgrades that I have made, or plan to make are governed mostly by my pocket book. AND, as it turns out, old fashioned seaman-like ways of doing things is not only cheaper, but often more robust. Take for example, a chart plotter that makes a "zzzt" sound and goes dead just after you entered a fog bank. If I had room, I would choose the paper chart spread out on the chart table (with a warm cuppa:D).
 
#15 · (Edited)
Our Nav Station is primarily used for navigation and it is my "office" as skipper/navigator. All of our monitoring systems, radios, main electrical panel etc. are located there. Our computer "plugs" into NEMA and the SSB at this location. Using our galley table isn't always practical for this purpose as it often is lowered into the "sleeping" position for extra crew, has no fiddles so it needs to be cleared while underway and there is no 12v or 120v power source located nearby. In harbor, our Nav does pull double duty as a TV stand, bar, or sideboard for entertaining (our miniature Christmas tree goes here). I find it easier to do my "playing" with GRIB files and navigating on Coastal Explorer on the computer then upload courses via NMEA rather than hand punching it into the chartplotter (very laborious and interferes with the helmsman who is trying to drive. There are also times when I find it better to have a crewmember down below monitoring and tracking AIS or radar targets and relaying the info up to the crew on deck. This frees them up to drive the boat and maintain the visual lookout. I'm also using the chartplotter as a repeater so the helmsman is also able to see what the person down below is looking at. I do this mostly when working my way through crowded shipping lanes in bad visability. The times when visibility is good, reasonable amount of traffic or when I'm shorthanded (when only one person is on watch) I find the pedestal mounted screen very handy and convenient.

 
#16 ·
I am with George B


Ice cubes...hmmm we have a stabdard 8 cubic ft refrigerated compartment divided off for frozen and refrigerated with an Alder Barbor Super cold machine. While not set up for cruising at months on a time, it is sufficiernt for our cruising for a few wekks. The Evaporator is the large one and contains 4- verticle ice cube trays. We only have a 35 ft boat with no generator and 660 ah batteries.

Minnie has an icemaker...a lot of boat and a generator,,,nice creature comforts you usually dont find on less the 40 ft.. We will be having margeritas on his boat.:cool::laugher:cool::laugher

Dave
 
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#19 ·
Minnie has an icemaker...a lot of boat and a generator,,,nice creature comforts you usually dont find on less the 40 ft.. We will be having margeritas on his boat.:cool::laugher:cool::laugher
All a matter of priority. Everyone has a locker they could give up and most of our ice is made while plugged in. A full tub will last for a couple of days off power, although, it will begin to melt. When cruising, we run the genset for an hour in the morning and evening and keep it frozen and loaded up.

Yes, we will have endless ritas on the rocks one of these days. (I'm getting partial to Mt. Gay and tonic lately too. Still need ice!!)
 
#17 ·
I can think of no other way to share with friends and family, the trip we've just done from say, the US to Tahiti, than pulling out a chart with all the notes, course, weather, etc. and laying it on the table. That alone is worth a chart table/nav station. Every trip we do over 200 miles has a chart marked and I still have all of them. It's hard to do this on a chart plotter especially when all the folks have to crowd around the back of the wheel to see it.:)

Then it's about the ritual of calculating the "day's work" and the excitement of seeing the destination approaching on the chart, taking weather reports (and making notes), running GRIB files on the computer, talking on the SSB to the available sailing net, filling out all the paperwork we'll need at the next port, checking electricity used through the night, filling in the ship's log for the previous watch, updating a blog, the list goes on.

Yes, you can do some of this from a sofa but really? If anybody on my boat seriously suggested getting rid of all that, they'll not be invited back.

And besides, if I'm going to enjoy a few drinks with friends and family, there's no place better than on deck. Sunsets viewed from the bar down below are nowhere near as good.;)

My nav station is definitely not obsolete.
 
#21 ·
I'm with the "keep the nav station" crowd provided you have enough boat. OK so most navigation is done electronically but NS is a nice place to sit and ponder or even pontificate. A good ns also allows you to wedge yourself into place. For mine, when I come off watch, particularly at night or in poor visibility its good to be able to sit down at the ns and simply look at plotter and/or chart. If you have made a mistake its a good time to realise it and correct.
 
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