Boating Knowledge Base
Have a sailing question? Access NauticEd’s sailing and boating knowledge base, and gain in-depth answers to your sailing questions. If you’re interested in powerboating, visit our new powerboating blog.
Action by a Stand-On Vessel Nav Rule
Strangely enough, the written text for the action of a Stand-On vessel is longer than that of a Give-Way vessel.
Leaving the Slip with a Sailboat
Wind coming into the slip channel and your boat is stern-to. This is best handled by steering out of the slip and then immediately downwind. Back out of the slip channel and well into the main channel before engaging forward.
Sailboat Fire Extinguishers and Requirements
Fire Extinguishers Fire Extinguishers are given a letter rating that matches the type of fire they will be battling.
Vessels in Restricted Visibility
What is the safe speed at night, in fog? As safe as it needs to be under good seamanship.
Mediterranean Mooring – Long Line Ashore
The long-line-ashore is a useful Mediterranean mooring method. It is mostly used in the Mediterranean as a customary way of mooring a lot of boats along a shoreline.
Operating the Engine – Getting Familiar with a Charter Boat
Many modern sailboats are equipped with integrated engine throttle and transmission shift systems; called the push-pull cabling system.
Sails – Getting Familiar with a Charter Boat
We’re pretty certain here that you know how to operate sails on a sailboat, however – chances are that you’re chartering a boat much bigger than you’re normally used to.
Navigation Units
Sailors are forever measuring stuff. This brings us to the subject of navigation units. As we all remember from the good ol’ school days, measurement is the process of comparing something with an established standard.
Sail Twist Basics
How can the wind direction be different between the top of the mast and the bottom?
The Complete Guide to Boat Footwear
Find the best tips in The Guide to Boat Footwear for choosing the perfect boat shoes for your boat outings.
Mast Head pull heeling versus wind heeling
Takeaways: Standing rigging isn’t the place to economize—it’s a load-management system. Use stretchy docklines for masthead pulls, avoid shock loads, and apply smooth, steady pressure. Snatch loads break rigs.
Towing
The following diagram shows how you can tow another vessel. Form a “bridle” from the rear cleats...
Anchoring Basics
Anchoring is not simply throwing a "hook" and letting out a line. Although by watching some sailors this seems to be their theory. The best way to approach anchoring is to dissect it into a series of individual steps.
Catamaran Maneuvering Mastery
As now learned, Cats can turn inside their own length, they can vector sideways, and using the bulldozer effect you can instantly rotate the Cat to point in any direction, you can do almost anything.
Sailboat Inverters
Sailboat Inverters are devices used to convert 12-volt DC battery electricity to AC 110-volt or 220-volt electricity. Special electronics in
Selecting an Anchoring Spot
Selecting an Anchoring Spot - Charts, both electronic and paper will tell you where the reliable anchoring spots are.
Wind
Winds can be gentle, hardly felt, like zephyrs flitting about in a local area, or they can be vast movements of air moving swiftly across oceans and continents at low and high altitudes.
Docking Maneuvers with Dual Rudders
With Dual Rudders there is no ability to spring the boat onto or off the dock! You have no water velocity over the rudders from either boat velocity or propwash.
The Engine – Getting Familiar with a Charter Boat
While this is a sailing boat propelled by the wind and mostly without the need for burning fossil fuels the most devastating breakdown besides hull failure is the engine.
Sailing Wind Velocity & Direction
The faster the boat sails into the wind, the more the apparent wind speed increases and the more it feels like it is coming from the front of the boat. They say "The apparent wind is forward of the true wind". This means the apparent wind feels like it comes from a more forward direction than the true wind.
Sailboat Generator or Large Battery Bank?
Dedicated electric generators on board sailboats are usually only reserved for large sailboats because of their weight and size. Unless there is a desire for large amounts of electricity...
Crew Briefing Video
It is important to know how much experience your crew has before you embark on any sailing adventure. For our boat, we created a video walkaround introduction to the boat covering safety items and also just general items on how we want our boat looked after.
NED Sailing Simulator
Before you play with NED, the sailing simulator, read this first. The graphic below is representative of a real wind meter on...
Fire on a Sailboat
Putting out fires quickly is essential. The sooner you find the source the quicker the fire can be extinguished.
