Securing non-human crew against the unexpected
Issue 117: Nov/Dec 2017
We were hand-steering my Southern Cross 28 in rather blustery winds on a fairly smooth Conception Bay, headed for the Royal Newfoundland Yacht Club, when a strong gust blew off the nearby cliffs and knocked the boat down, throwing all of the crew off balance. The starboard rail went under and water gushed into the cockpit. When my little ship righted herself, I saw that my trusty Simrad Tillerpilot had washed overboard.
Fortunately, we were within sight of our destination, the end of a two-month voyage from Lake St. Clair, Michigan, to St. John’s, Newfoundland, where we delivered the Southern Cross to her new owners. The autopilot had kept us on course for two months and 2,000 miles with impeccable dependability. It was a valuable piece of equipment and would have been deeply missed had we lost it earlier in our voyage. We had been lucky, yet I couldn’t help but think how avoidable the loss was.
Five years later, finally launching my newly restored good old boat, a Herreshoff 27 cat ketch, I decided to heed the lesson I’d learned aboard my Southern Cross.
Before using the tiller pilot, I drilled a small hole through the back plastic core of the ram, a hole big enough to pass a small high-strength line through, but small enough that it did not damage the integrity of the unit.
The ram’s base pin fits into an aluminum support fastened to the cockpit seatback, and I was able to use a hole already in the support to receive a quick-disconnect pin. I enlarged the hole in the tube to accept the 10mm pin, and enlarged the hole in the cap of the pin for the tether.
Not only will my modification keep this important equipment from going overboard if the ram’s base pin disconnects from the coaming bracket, it will also keep it from damaging its power cord or crashing about in the cockpit. Lashings would have worked as well as anything, but would have been a bit harder to stow when not needed. The important thing is that I make sure my valuable crew member wears a lifeline and does not go overboard in the event the unexpected happens again.
Lee Nyboer has been sailing on Lake St. Clair for about 55 years. A jack-of-all-trades, Lee likes creating things that work as expected. Although he has dreamed of writing hundreds of articles, this is the first one he’s ever submitted for publication.
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