From: Ian
Sent: September-25-09 7:29 AM
To: John Curry
Subject: Re: Hydrovane

John

Hope you enjoyed the Southampton Show.

Here is the photo for your website. I include this one as it shows the Hydrovane in use with our dinghy to show that you can actually use the Hydrovane with a dinghy stowed in the davits – not a very windy day though! This set up works really well like this and the dinghy does not interfere with the Hydrovane – in fact the Hydrovane helps to keep the dinghy solid and stop it moving around.

When we were researching wind steering systems we couldn’t find any images of a Hydrovane fitted to a boat with davits – although you said this was possible – so you may find this picture useful in your marketing. If you need any more please let me know. Note also that the Hydrovane is slightly offset to allow us to use the centre gate to access the bathing ladder. Although the stern looks crowded it all fits pretty well together – the important thing was to plan everything!! I didn’t plan as well as I should have and very nearly made a significant mistake with regard to positioning but corrected it just in time.

Regards
Ian

From: Ian
Sent: August-28-09 8:30 PM
To: John Curry
Subject: Hydrovane

Dear John

We took delivery of our Hydrovane in Feb and installed it during Jun – these things always take longer than expected. But we have now left our home port in UK and are heading down towards the Med. I had never used the Hydrovane before and was slightly aware that this was a huge investment for something I had never tried. We have gone for a slight offset to give us access to the bathing steps.

On our channel crossing recently the wind was ideal to use the Hydrovane as we were pretty much close hauled for most of the way and needed to claw some distance up wind if possible. I had read the instructions but at the first attempt the Hydrovane took up the steering flawlessly – it was fantastic and took us all the way across the channel without any problem – far more comfortable and safer than if we had been steering and importantly without using any electrical power. We made a few course changes using the course correction line so we didn’t need to get out of the cockpit. I am now a Hydrovane convert and realise that it is one of the best purchases that I have made to prepare for our cruises.

Hope that you enjoy the Southampton show if you are over for that. I will not be there but will be at London in Jan so may see you there.

Regards
Ian