Sea Searcher Magnet

[ash]

I have a Sea Searcher Magnet, which I inherited with my Leisure 17. It has been useful on a few occasions, once for me, and other times when loaned out. It lives ( lived ) in the lazarette locker.

I also have a Raymarine ST1000+ Tiller Pilot, which doesn't get used much. I use it to hold a course whilst I hoist / drop the sails when single handed.

I've never been entirely happy with the ST, despite a few goes at the circles, and even correcting for Latitude, it was never consistantly accurate with it's heading.

Anyway on the first day of my holiday I was motoring ( the wind was very light and unkind in it's direction, and I had my new Beta toy to play with ) so I fitted the ST and fiddled about with it.

I suddenly had a thought - the Sea Searcher ! - so watching the display intently, I leant into the locker and picked up the magnet. The display never flickered, but the tiller was sawing madly and we were weaving down the loch at 5 knts. Of course, the display was showing intended course.

Further tests with the ST on standby showed that the magnet affected it from as far as 2 metres away! Much more sensitive than the magnetic compass on the bulkhead.

With the magnet banished to the forepeak, further circling ( I always feel embarrassed during this procedure so usually stand nonchalantly smoking a ciggy ) gave a deviation of 10 rather than the previous 30, so I have hopes of the auto tack function working now.

Ash

[Swagman]

Yup. We've learned to live with a rapid turn to port when we activate the port electric winch........it's all magic to me.

[sahona]

hard starboard when we used the SSB(xmit) on the last boat.