From: Marc Elbet
Sent: April-03-12
To: Valerie Williams; Will Curry
Subject: ARC 2011 Hydrovane

Thank you for the answer Will,

The Hydrovane was really great!

It was our fourth crew on Hanami II and was named “Barry” by the 2 other UK crews.
It took a day or two to master the fine tuning of it but once we got used to and the sails were well established Barry did a sterling job and consistently steered downwind and some time full downwind for 70% of the trip.

We were quite surprised by the quality of it as downwind is not supposed to be the best wind direction for a wind vane. It was very much appreciated as we experienced some electrical issues during all the crossing and went short of power at some time. Crossing with the autopilot only would have been impossible except if running the engine or the generator half the day which was not possible.

There were small issues, sometimes, when the wind was around 160° or more from behind and as David logged it, “Barry is behaving perfectly, but sometimes gets a bit confused with a big swell and gust at the same time.” It then necessitates some manual adjustments but that’s OK, that’s why we have a man on watch.

Technically speaking, it was easy to install and very easy to take off after the crossing.

Taking it off on the OVNI is almost mandatory as it lies at the place where the tender is usually hanging from its aft support.

During the crossing we had fruits and vegetables in a net where the tender usually is and this had to be adapted as the bottom of net was some time blocking the top of the wane but we managed to keep both.

Well, to make a long story short: it is a great piece of equipment and as it has its own rudder there are no additional ropes blocking the cockpit, no additional blocks, no potential chafe to take care of but an additional feeling of security as it provides a third rudder if we have issues with the boat’s steering system. A ‘must have’ one should say. From this perspective Adrian Flanagan is right!

One small downside for European boats: it needs having US (non metric) spare bolts screws and nuts as those have a very clear tendency to migrate to water at the most inappropriate time!

[Editor’s note: In 2016, most bolts on the unit were switched to metric]

Here are some compressed pictures and a couple short movies.

I hope you will be able to open and use them. If not tell me I will send in another format.
Thanks for sending the case screw then.

All the best,

Marc

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