"Lloyd Sumpter" wrote in message
...
Hi,

Considering buying a radar, so I have a few questions:

1. On a sailboat, where do you put the display? I rarely steer from
behind the
wheel, mainly by sitting on one of the gunwales beside the wheel, or
sometimes
by Otto while hiding from the rain under the dodger (hence the
name... ).

At the chart table (have a tiller, not wheel, so no wheel mounted
instrument binnacle). I have been considering mounting the display on a
swivel to be able to turn it to face the companionway directly.

2. Realistically, how far do you set the max range? I'm seeing that
unless I
mount the antenna up the mast, I'm not gonna get more than maybe 10
miles range
no matter what unit I buy. Then again, if I see a freighter steaming
at 30
knots, 10 miles away, I still have 20 minutes to do something. Is a
20-mile
range worth getting?

I find 16 miles more than adequate and rarely use more than 8 miles.
When keeping radar watch, don't forget to cycle regularly through the
ranges. On a small set a weak target (e.g. yacht with no reflector) may
only show at 1 mile or less and not be seen on a set at 16 mile range
but be readily visible on the 1 or 2 mile setting.

3. Do you trust yours enough to use it instead of a "watch" (ie watch
the radar
screen instead of where you're going)? Trying to decide if getting a
radar will
increase my cruising time significantly (ie more confidence in running
at night)

In general No. Particularly in areas of lobster pots a visual watch is
essential. OTOH with radar and solo I will now spend more time at the
chart table than when without radar.

4. I see a "guard zone alarm" but no "constant-bearing alarm". Why
not? wouldn't
a constant-bearing alarm be far more useful (and not that hard to
implement)?

For a constant bearing alarm to work you would probably need to
initially mark a potential target with the cursor whichwoulkd then allow
the machine to track it. I also sail on Tall Ships with commercial gyro
stabilised ARPA radars. We can 'mark' up to 30 targets and the readout
gives the target's course, speed, closest point of approach and time to
CPA. However you are now talking real money! On my little radar I have
not found the guard zone to be useful as it is too often triggered by
spurious clutter.

5. I'm looking at the Furuno 1623 or 1712, or the JRC 1000. I have a
Furuno
GP-31 GPS and I'm impressed by the quality (also, probably 90% of
commercial
boats around here have Furuno radars). Any comments?

Happy with my small Furuno. The ability to link with GPS is key. One
can put in a GPS waypoint and this then shows as a 'lolipop' on the
radar, so easy to identify a buoy set as a waypoint and differentiate
from any other trgets nearby (e.g. yachts jilling around the buoy in
thick fog)

6. Is it worth while to mount the antenna up the mast, or should I use
a
"dedicated" mast at the transom?

I use a mast mount - cheaper than a pole and a view from higher up. I
have not noticed any adverse heeling effect from the extra weight aloft.

That's all for now...dreaming on a dull winter's day...

I bought radar about 4 / 5 years ago after aborting a channel crossing
to France in poor visibility sailing 2 up. Since then it has been
frequently helpful (e.g. I am not good at estimating distances off of
large vessels in shipping lanes, radar shows this exactly) and
invaluable on a few occasions - this year we lost vis off the NW coast
of France and it was 0.1 - 1 mile all the way to within the Solent,
about 180 miles. Without radar that passage would have been alarming at
least!

Lloyd Sumpter
"Far Cove" Catalina 36

Tony Boas
Sadler 34 - Bold Warrior