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Over reliance on electronics

7K views 60 replies 25 participants last post by  Brent Swain 
#1 ·
#2 ·
SanderO wrote the first reply?

Seriously? This guy needs to look out the ******* window more, and consider a lead line and a lump of tallow as a "backup depth sensor". But more realistically, the author is a marine electronics reviewer who uses his own boat as a floating (or occasionally motoring) test bed, so it makes a sort of sense that he would view a flat-water voyage as a battle of the digital screens.

Any engine sensing technology that can cripple the engine until it gets turned off isn't worth a damn in my mind, however. The Maretron "see your engine water temp even as you are checking bilge strokes and apparent wind angle" multi-function displays SOUND good, until you really think of the havoc you would have with a single frayed wire in the mix.

If I must install a few more analog dials and live without GPS mated to the AP, I will somehow struggle on...
 
#7 ·
IMO you shouldn't have any equipment on your boat you don't fully understand.
Well, that ought to clear the waterways!

I'm OK. I like kayaking just fine.

________________

Actually, I kind of agree with the exception of equipment I'm willing to do without (ie., if my GPS goes out I have other means).
 
#4 ·
What was that Scotty of Star Trek said? Oh yah! The more complex the vessel becomes, the easier to bollex it up. And you also have Murphey's law in effect... If anything can go wrong. IT WILL.
 
#6 ·
"IMO you shouldn't have any equipment on your boat you don't fully understand."
Ask the pilot on a 747 if he knows how to change the oil on his engines. Or the brakes. Don't expect so.
And while commercial aircraft have generally gone from 4 engines to 2 because they gain reliability by having fewer redundant systems to fail (catch 22) complexity is not necessarily a problem, if you have reliable systems.

A sextant may be more reliable than a GPS--but drop either one and it is offline.
 
#8 ·
I totally agree with the self reliance sentiment in Scotty's post but Hello is right. Realistically, both diesel engines and most electronics are beyond the abilities and/or knowledge of most sailors. Basic troubleshooting and maintenance is about as far as any of us will ever get with those systems. How many of us are capable of, or equipped for, rebuilding a high pressure fuel pump? Similarly for the circuitry in a plotter?

That's the reason behind backup systems, alternate systems and careful maintenance.

I'm no gadget freak but I will definitely have a big plotter on my next boat - the first time I used a Ray C80 was an epiphany. :cool:
 
#9 ·
If anybody thinks a sextant is "more reliable" than GPS has not HAD to use one.
It takes a considerable amount of practice and talent to get a fairly accurate LOP, especially on a small craft at sea, let alone the several it takes to get a good fix. Once one has mastered the sextant, mother nature and Neptune still have to condescend to allow you to get a "sight". A 4 second error in time can produce a one mile error in navigation, so exact time is critical as well.
On my circumnavigation in the 70's, it was overcast and I could not get a single sight on the sail from New Caledonia and Bundaberg, Oz, until I had already passed through the passage north of Frazer Island. I'd have given anything for any form of electronic navigation, had any existed in those days.
Sailing today with all the electronics I can afford has diminished the value of Rolaid's stock and allows me to sleep more and work much less, especially on passages.
I love my chartplotter and other than the ICW, it has been perfect everywhere I been, but of course, I don't know if will be perfect where I haven't gone yet.
IMO one should concentrate on learning to read the water, the colors, the ripples caused by currents and underwater obstructions and let the sextant die a dignified death. GPS is a gift and a boon to those of us who venture out on the water and redundancy is the key to continuous navigation. And common sense!
 
#10 · (Edited)
My friend with the C80 once crewed a boat from Van. to S.F. in the days before GPS - 12 days and they never got a single sight. They had to dead reckon the entire trip.

The Pardeys described their voyage from Japan to Victoria B.C. - 45 days with only 2 iffy sights through overcast.

I'll take the plotter first as well. :)
 
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#14 ·
Idk I've been using GPS for years and its pretty dam reliable. Redundancy is I have navionics in my iPad for primary navigation, I have it in my cell phone for backup or for just days ailing, most of the people I sail with have a chart plotter on their phones and there are even ais transmit and receive apps for coastal navigation! Short of some massive solar event, nuclear bomb caused emp, or space war with the Chinese, I'm not that concerned about losing GPS navigation.

Of greater concern is the irregular updating of the charts themselves IMHO, esp after sandy...
 
#16 ·
Even My cabin light has a gimbling oil lamp as a back up. I remember waking to the smell of burnt rubber crossing to the Bahamas in 1978 with Grandpa. An electrical fire in the pannel. We lost all electronics. Of course back then that meant lights and a vhf, which is all I still have on the same boat today. My gps is a hand held that uses AA batts. I turn it on a couple of times a day to check my D.R.'s.
 
#17 ·
. My gps is a hand held that uses AA batts. I turn it on a couple of times a day to check my D.R.'s.
Why not leave it on all the time? Surely the safety aspect of a continuously updated position is worth the cost of a couple of AA batteries?
You will also gain a far more accurate idea of currents, leeway etc.

If the cost of the batteries is a concern use some rechargeables. The cost will cents a day.

There seems to be a perception that doing without GPS information is some how virtuous. To have ready access to the information, but to deliberately ignore it seems rather unwise. A good navigator uses all the tools available, in my estimation.
 
#22 ·
Wow, my GPS/Plotter tells me if there's something beneath the keel. It keeps me on the correct course, much better than the compass, it provides me with XTE information so I know just how far the winds have pushed me off the rum line, it provides with with speed over ground, depth, full sonar imaging, time to waypoint, distance to waypoint, time of day, L/L, tidal information, tidal current information, and much, much more. When I install the 3G Radar it will provide me with 24 miles of range with alarms for targets, provide incredible target information, and the ability to see things such as approaching thunderstorms at distances to 36 miles, which is usually sufficient time to make ready for bad weather conditions.

Additionally, when I get around to making the connections, I also have full engine information: Oil pressure, engine temperature, RPM, fuel level, and more. It's all right there, all on the display, and each parameter has alarms. It's right there in front of me and I can monitor the information constantly, while still using my primary safety device - my eyes.

So, while you're looking around and absorbing what you can see, which I'm also doing, I'm also absorbing information that you cannot see, which may be even more important, especially when bad weather is closing in from behind you. That 7-inch, high-definition screen sitting at the helm station with full sonar information and imaging can provide you with things the chart will never reveal. And, while you're looking at the chart, you're not looking at what's in front of you. With the GPS/Plotter at the helm station you can do both, plus see what's beneath you. And, with the addition of 3G radar, and the antenna on the mast, see what's over horizon - beyond your view from the cockpit.

Now, I'm not anti paper charts - I have them and use them. But, as previously stated, those charts, and chart books are frequently out of date. At least I can update the GPS/Plotter via the internet, and thanks to a $19 USB antenna, I have internet connections at most locations I anchor for the night. I can't update the charts as easily, and as inexpensively.

Good Luck,

Gary :cool:
 
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#23 ·
Hey Gary

Like I said, each person manages information differently (and while we're comparing, a top of the range chart plotter is a little different to a Garmin 76 handheld GPS, which was the debate I was having with Capt Aaron and Noelex).

There are some of us that have turned sailing into a cutting edge science, there are some of that still view it as a simple way of life. I clearly fall into the latter.

If your choice is to chemically analyse the seagull droppings on your deck, knock yourself out.:)
 
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#24 ·
In my opinion it is all a trade off.

There are pluses and minuses to using basic technology, and there are also pluses and minuses to using electronics, we all have to decide for ourselves what tools and techniques we are going to learn and use.

That said, I do think it is easy to be seduced into thinking you know more about navigation than you really do when you rely too much on electronics.
 
#28 ·
" i never met SINGLE ONE american that can speak SINGLE ONE foreign language even with "poor spelling and punctuation" "
We are very much spoiled by the ability to travel 3000 miles without crossing a border.
I do have some language skills, a smattering of several but how many depends on whether you count horse and dog, both of which can be important languages in some places. In every language that I speak, I have perfect punctuation and spelling. In those that I might try to write, the punctuation and spelling are a different issue.

What I'd like to know is how come my telephone and thermos bottle are so damned smart, they understand what to do no matter what language is used with them. Well, except with the dog, he has no concept of what the telephone is, and ignores every sound that comes out of it, regardless of language.
 
#29 ·
ahahaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa aa

reading this I wonder how they succeeded to navigate 30 years ago,, let alone one hundred years ago.
what was it like traveling to japan 100 years ago?

those gadgets are invented for people who barely can caunt to 10 let alone to take moon or mars sight.


It never ceases to amaze me how many individuals pooh-pooh advancements in navigation, something that has likely happened since the invention of the compass. The same individuals are sailing around in fiberglass boats, with roller furling, in the mast furling, talking on their cellular telephones, looking for storms with their I-phone wather app, drinking canned beer, bottled rum, etc... Yep, real traditionalist!

Oh, and 100 years ago, most sailors, many of whom were commercial fishermen breathed a sigh of relief when they were lucky enough to eventually find their way home. Anyone that knows the history of commercial fishing, is well aware of the many, many tragedies at sea that took place when veteran sailors were limited to charts, a compass and a sextant. The rocky shoals of the world are filled with the debris from these vessels, while the adjacent shores often became the final resting place for the men who sailed aboard them.

Not only did advancements in marine navigational technology make sailing, and boating safer, it took a lot of the guesswork out of making a safe passage. Additionally, these devices require someone with more the rudimentary knowledge of boating in order to operate them with any degree of accuracy. "Can't count to 10" just don't cut it. These are not plug and play devices, and the vast majority of them require a significant learning curve in order to utilize the various functions.

I guess a true sailing purest will be out there with their wooden-hulled, hemp and pitch caulked, leaking vessel, rigged with rope rigging, canvas sails, buckets for bilge pumps, and a bilge filled with rounded keel stones, all this while attempting to determine where they are using nothing more than a WAG (wild ass guess) on a stormy night at sea. Oh, and the guys coming to your rescue, the USCG, they'll find you pretty quickly when you provide them with your exact lat/lon coordinates derived from your sextant that can't take sightings through the clouds. Whoops, almost forgot, you're still using semifore and waving flags or swinging a kerosene lantern in the middle of the night because satphones, VHF and Single Sideband radios are products of advanced technology. Guess you're gonna' go down with the ship!

Lots of luck,

Gary :cool:
 
#31 ·
It never ceases to amaze me how many individuals pooh-pooh advancements in navigation, something that has likely happened since the invention of the compass.

Gary :cool:
Gary

I don't believe there is more than 0.002% of the members of this forum who still regularly use a sextant or depend on it for their navigation. I know I don't. So in essence they (we) are not pooh-poohing the use of electronic navigational aids.

The OP posed the question: Is there over-reliance on electronics. Well yes, I believe there is. Simply because I see folks who have bought boats and they learn how to sail and then begin to plan their offshore trips to the islands.

Amongst the things they consider important are watermakers to feed the automatic washing machine and inverters big enough to drive the microwave and hair dryer.

And when you ask them of their navigational training, the common refrain is "we have a top-of-the-range chart plotter, we have AIS and we have a 3D colour radar, what more do we need?"

Well, I just find that a little scary because all of those things rely on electricity and that is one of the less reliable supply lines on any boat. If I had to make the continued safety of people on my boat dependant on the continued supply of electricity I would consider myself very irresponsible. And with all your immediately updating charts on the chart plotter you are reliant on that unstable system.

It's like I said on a thread elsewhere - what are you going to do when that beautiful screen goes black? And with respect, only very naive boat owners believe that it can't. From your first post I gathered that EVERY piece of information on your boat will soon be presented to you on one display. Really - good luck with that.

Oh, and by the way, good luck also with well-managed cross track error information that helps you sail down the rhumb line - many other boats/ships with fancy chart plotters will agree with you and are doing the same thing. :)
 
#32 ·
I agree with much of what you stated above. In my case, if the screen goes black, it's not a problem - I switch on one of the 2 backup GPS/Plotters I have onboard. If all three go dead, and all 5 batteries die, I'll reach on the bookshelf and pick out the appropriate chart book(s). Yes, I have, and use paper charts, mainly in conjunction with the GPS/Plotter. As some stated earlier, they provide me with a big picture, but zooming in with a paper chart is not a possibility. Granted, some have insets, but they too are limited.

Cheers,

Gary :cool:
 
#34 ·
Your cockpits can look like Starfleet command if you want, just remember to raise your heads once in a while and look around you. Too many times I see boats motoring past us and the helmsman never looks up from his electronics. Not to mention the time a boat went by on autopilot and there wasn't a helmsman.
 
#35 · (Edited by Moderator)
I think all skippers should be confident navigating traditionally.

However the reality is that mapping and GPS systems, frequently with independent battery supplies, are becoming very cheap and multiplying rapidly.

I seem to accumulating 2-3 GPS units a year, many with built in maps. Some precaution concerning lightening strikes needs to be considered, but given the multitude of GPS units storing a couple in a faraday cage is sensible.

As a cruising boat I currently have 12 GPS units and 8 electronic mapping systems. 9 independent battery systems.

Could all these GPS and mapping systems fail? Certainly, the sea is a hard environment. However I have far fewer backups in the event of rudder failure, hull strike, fire etc etc.

I don't lay awake at night worrying about GPS failure. Navigation without GPS is not difficult. Managing a boat without a rudder, or rig, following a fire, or with a hole below the waterline even MOB. These are the important catastrophic events that pose a real risk to my vessel and perhaps my life.

Sure, I could stuff up navigation and end up hitting rock, but I fail to see how turning off the GPS decreases the risk. Removing a valuable source of navigational information could only increase, rather than decrease the risk in my view.
 
#37 ·
I think all skippers should be confident navigating traditionally.
I think thats a load of bollocks. (Thats my fav word of the day. But just today)
Teaching people the old outdated school like sextant sights just bores the student. It needs to be kept relevant.
Compas swingers are a thing of the past because a compass doesnt need to be accurate anymore, its just a reference, an approximation, good enough for emergency.
Now courses should covering, not to a proficent level as in the past, getting to a port in case of an emergency. That uses differenct techniques that can be learned basically. Things like you are off the east coast USA in June. West is where the sun sets, go west, when you see land, if no visual identification, wave madly, wait for a ship and follow, vhf the Coasties etc. one doesnt need to have precise L&L and make it to the exact destination, one merely needs to get to a safe port.

As the older lot of sailors die and theres generational change the rediculousness of the paper/non ecn position will be come irrelevant. All cell phones will have GPS, all will probably be Satellite connected, all wil have world maps available without cell connection (with Advertising!!!!!). Big brother will know where you are anyway with his chip up your bum.

The last bit of paper has left the modern world of aircraft, space flights, science, and even literature. Ask and author to write a page with a pen and his hand will be shakey, the prose weak and sentences wrong, but give him his computer and his words will flow.....

Damn it! I have to go! My refrigerator with its internet connection has listed my days social events! I am meeting 3 (three!) females all with huge gazooballys!

Mark
 
#39 ·
"but tell me how, when you are 1500Nm from the nearest GPS-related thing (land), does having a GPS permanently on reduce risk? "
Is that a trick question?

You see, if you have the GPS turned off, and your boat is abducted by a UFO or vortexed through the Bermuda Triangle, and suddenly you are dropped off near a rocky lee shore, having the GPS ON will give you that valuable warning that you now are in the wrong place at the wrong time.

If you had your GPS off, you might notice the bright lights and spinning needles, but you'd have no idea how much imminent danger you were in.

What, it never happened to you?
 
#44 ·
I love GPS. But I think perhaps some of the GPS champions never sail in changeable areas.

I love to sail the Delmarva area. Inlets move and often my GPS shows me on dry land. THE CG move markers--in those inlets that are marked--with the passage of every major storm. These changes will not be on your chart plotter, as they don't even make the NOAA charts; they are simply listed as "changable." This sort of close in piloting relies on and eye for the water and the lay of the shore. I've seen boats go a ground TWICE in the same spot within 30 minutes, upset because the GPS said there was a channel there! As I pulled them off, I had to gently explain that we had established that the channel wasn't there the first time I pulled them off, and that I prefer they followed me on their third attempt, just in case I was right.

The point is we must navigate by ALL means available, which requires getting the eyes up out of the cockpit.
 
#47 · (Edited)
Cannot agree more. I have said so in another thread. That does not mean you don't take advantage of the plotter and GPS. You have just to know how to use it and its limitations. I agree that many don't know they have them and think that is a magical tool 100% reliable.

I believe that the best tool available are still our eyes and ears. That does not mean that I will not take advantage of all the rest that is available, I mean, plotter/GPS, radar and AIS.;)

Regards

Paulo
 
#49 ·
I think it is negligent to go to sea and not have at least a basic understanding of navigating without electronics. The ocean is featureless, and dangerous, it isn't like you can just pull over and ask for directions if you can't find your way.

The argument has been raised that you can always have enough redundancy for GPS that you don't need to know the basics, but that doesn't make any sense because it presumes that having a fix is all there is to navigation, and it isn't.

Go look at Bowditch, it devotes 5 chapters to electronic navigation, only one of which is for GPS, and another for chart plotting, 6 chapters are devoted to celestial navigation ... Gosh, I wonder what the other 26 chapters of the book are about ?
 
#50 ·
Yes I think you need to be accomplished in both. A we age we cannot fight the fact tha tecnology increases faster than we age and sometimes it means moderating our staid ideas of what is better/ right. Modern means using electrontics make help increase safety in leaps and bounds. It has its limitations and as some say false sense of secutiry built into using it, but if you recogize that, the prudet moder sailor can be adept in both.

BTW for most of us celestrail navagation is worthless and will continue to be IMHO and yes I was taught and once used it when crossing the Atlantic 37 year ago.

While I aree with the first couple of paragaphs, the Bowditch example is not really a good one. Theier last major change was 1995. hardly modern

Bowditch


The present volume, while retaining the basic format of the 1958 version, reorganizes the subjects, deletes obsolete text, and adds new material to keep pace with the extensive changes in navigation that have taken place in the electronic age.

This 1995 edition of the American Practical Navigator incorporates extensive changes in organization, format, and content. Recent advances in navigational electronics, communications, positioning, and other technologies have transformed the way navigation is practised at sea, and it is clear that even more changes are forthcoming. The changes to this edition of Bowditch are intended to ensure that this publication remains the premier reference work for practical marine navigation. Concerted efforts were made to return to Nathaniel Bowditch's original intention "to put down in the book nothing I can't teach the crew." To this end, many complex formulas and equations have been eliminated, and emphasis placed on the capabilities and limitations of various navigation systems and how to use them, instead of explaining complex technical and theoretical details. This edition replaces but does not cancel former editions, which may be retained and consulted as to navigation methods not discussed herein.

The former Volume II has been incorporated into the primary volume to save space and production cost. For similar reasons, the book is now published on a larger page size. These two changes allow the publisher to present a single, comprehensive navigation science reference which explains modern navigational methods while respecting traditional ones. The goal of the changes was to put as much useful information before the navigator as possible in the most understandable and readable format.
 
#56 ·
A couple days ago, I decided to head offshore and try to find some dolphin just outside the reef, east of Sombrero Key Light. When conditions are right, the Sargasso weed stacks up in large patches this time of year, and when you find a good size patch of Sargasso weed you will usually find lots of Mahi-Mahi lurking beneath it.

The trip wasn't far from Boot Key Harbor, just 9 miles. The first leg involved passing through Sister's Creek, which is fairly deep until you get to the mouth of the creek, where the bottom quickly comes up to 5 feet. That means I have about a foot of clearance if I'm in the right slot through the channel, which is very narrow. That depth is displayed on my GPS/Plotter and an alarm goes off when I enter the 5-foot zone.

Once outside the creek in Hawk Channel I have two options - proceed down Hawk Channel, or head out through the reef. Heading down Hawk Channel would add a couple miles to the distance, so I opted to go through the reef. Now, I'm one of those individuals that loves to sail through the reef. I love watching the beautiful underwater world unfold beneath the boat, I enjoy seeing big grouper and barracuda fleeing as I approach, and the schools of reef dwellers can be fascinating.

The depths on the GPS plotter, and the locations of the very shallow shoal areas were extremely accurate. When the chart-plotter revealed a 21-foot deep passage through the reef to the Atlantic's azure blue waters, the depth plotter's depth finder and bottom contour information was dead on. It also revealed a 4-foot deep patch of coral that was about 50-feet south of where I passed through the reef, and that's exactly where it was.

I guess my point here is that yes, this information is on the paper chart as well, however, the only visual reference point was Sombrero Light, which was about a mile away. The GPS/Plotter provided pinpoint accuracy, thus allowing safe passage through the reef. The passage area is about 150 feet wide, no one else was on the boat to sling a weight to test the depth, the waves were about 4-feet, thus the captain was glued to the helm in order to maintain course control. In this, and many other instances I've encountered in more than 6-decades on the water, that GPS/Plotter is far superior to paper charts. And, with the 20-MPH winds, that 3X4-foot chart would have blown overboard as soon as it was opened.

I guess from my perspective, particularly as a single-handed sailor, the advancements in electronic navigation are essential tools - not just fancy gadgets or toys. Over the years I've found them extremely accurate and reliable. In my case, I've only had a single GPS failure, which occurred shortly after a near miss lightning strike in Chesapeake Bay, and a Loran-C problem, which was interference during a thunder storm. In both instances, I had no problem finding my way home.

Almost forgot - I didn't find the dolphin, probably because the wind had broken up the organized patches of Sargasso weeds.

Cheers,

Gary :cool:
 
#57 · (Edited)
...
The depths on the GPS plotter, and the locations of the very shallow shoal areas were extremely accurate. When the chart-plotter revealed a 21-foot deep passage through the reef to the Atlantic's azure blue waters, the depth plotter's depth finder and bottom contour information was dead on. It also revealed a 4-foot deep patch of coral that was about 50-feet south of where I passed through the reef, and that's exactly where it was.

...
Most of the time is accurate but you have to know that sometimes isn't and if you have a over confidence on that accuracy you can get in real trouble. It had happened to me several times, not to be in trouble, but the accuracy being very poor, not to say misleading.

That has nothing to do with the GPS accuracy but with the charts that served as support for the information on the map in your plotter. The earth is not flat and the chart makers used different projection systems to make them flat. A good plotter has on the menu a choice of about 20 different projection systems used to make maps, to permit an adjustment between GPS position and the position marked on the map.

Many just don't know about this, other used cheap plotters that only have the most common reference system and even the ones that have god marine plotters will find that sometimes the system used for making the map is not available on the plotter. Those at least will know that in that region they will get inevitable errors, some with hundreds meters differences. And I am not talking just about exotic places, that happens for instance in Croatia that is one of the most common sailing destinations.

Believe me, many don't know about this. The guys on the Croatian charter company did not know nothing about it or that the plotter they had in the boats had the wrong setting or even that their plotter had a menu with different settings for different map systems.;)

Regards

Paulo
 
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