Mys Terry wrote:
On 7 Jun 2006 17:03:26 -0700, "
wrote:


Or, you can visit this site and read a comment by a spokesman for a
boat manufacturer (that places the helm to starboard) that "visibility
from inside the cabin in our number one priority....." with regard to
location of the helm.

http://www.fishsniffer.com/cgi-bin/f...1117771557/240



Yeah, they HAD to put it there because of where they put the stand up head! It
was blocking the view too much if they put the wheel anywhere else. In other
words, it does NOT support your claim.

I never said you were the only person who might be wrong about the reasons why
the wheel is on the starboard side.

No, but now you have chosen to completely ignore the other site I
offered as well as misconstrue the site you are referencing. Did you
recently live in Derby, KS?

The boat builder was defending a decision to place the head on the
starboard side, immediately aft of the helm, because placing it in the
aft port quarter blocked visiblity
from the starboard forequarter where the helm is placed. By placing it
in the aft starboard quarter and putting windows on all sides of the
head, (that can be momentarily screened when needed for privacy), there
is a direct view aft from the starboard helm. If the head were placed
in the aft port quarter and the helmsman were trying to look through it
at an angle visibility would be reduced.

You also said that I was "making it up as I go along" and that you had
"never heard anybody else" advance a reason other than Norse tradition
in "50 years of boating". I believe
that I was able to advance your education considerably with the site
that you chose either not to look at or to ignore in your lame
rebuttal. Perhaps the other boaters on the site you ignored are "full
of baloney" as well?

But go right ahead and believe that people who don't share your
*opinion* are "wrong".
My point that there are a number of practical reasons for locating the
helm to starboard has not been refuted by your mean spirited insults
and nonsense. Nor are the practical reasons others advance for locating
the helm to starboard refuted by your assertion that they are wrong as
well.

Shall we play duelling web sites? Can you post a single reference
stating that the only reason for the overwhelming majority of
powerboats locating the helm to starboard is Norse tradition? Or are
you "making it up as you go along?"

Aren't you a sailor? If so, you are probably also unaware of yet an
additional reason that many of the smallest powerboats put the helm to
starboard. Rotation of a large prop on a single screw runabout can
actually cause a slight list to port at higher speeds. If there is only
one person aboard it will be the helmsman, and placing him or her to
starboard tends to correct the list. Placing the helmsman to port would
exaggerate the list. This isn't a problem on larger displacement,
deeper draft, or slower boats but it is a factor on runabouts.

If you have been boating 50 years then you clearly remember the first
decade after WWII.
Mass produced runabouts, heck even the wide spread of a "middle class"
lifestyle where a family would have a runabout on a boat trailer, were
new phenomena. Putting the helm to port, (as was common in that era),
was a good marketing ploy in North America. "Don't worry, Mr. Jones! Of
course you can drive a boat! Look, it's got a steering wheel, a
windshield and a horn- just like your family car!" The wholesale
relocation of the helm to the starboard side of the boat (and the
exceptions prove the rule) may be consistent with Norse tradition but
it was not motivated by that tradition.