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.
Crew Safety Briefing
You can avoid many emergencies by conducting a proper safety briefing before leaving the dock.
Vessel Lights and Shapes
Nighttime can be a beautiful time to sail. However, night vision is not the same as day vision and so rules have been established to ensure safety.
Mediterranean Mooring Techniques
Mediterranean Mooring Techniques is where the rubber meets the road—or, in this case, where the gel coat does not touch the big bad hard concrete wall.
Charter Freezer and Fridge Management
Freezers are typically top-loading and very deep. Take from home 4 -5 fabric shopping bags to stow similar items in the freezer. In doing this you...
Getting Familiar with the Charter Boat
Prior to releasing the boat to you, the charter company will give you a reasonably extensive walk through the boat.
Crew Overboard
Crew ("Man") Overboard (MOB) is fortunately relatively rare, but chances are that in your sailing career it will happen.
The Nautical Chart
Safely maneuvering a vessel while using positions derived from various coastal and near coastal sources is called coastal navigation.
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.
Starting the Engine – Getting Familiar with a Charter Boat
Regarding the starting procedure, we’re assuming that since you’re actually commanding a sailboat you pretty much know how to turn the key and all the other safety precautions.
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...
The Nautical Chart on a Charter
Even though most sailboat charters are within island groups where the next landfall is typically within sight, every boat should be equipped with complete large-scale charts of the area.
Anchoring Courtesy
After safely and securely anchoring your vessel, there are certain factors to contend with - most are common sense.
Key Sailboat Instruments
Sailboat Instrumentation can be very sophisticated and intelligent. Most electronic displays provide a wide range of menus of useful information...
Weather Warnings
Weather services will also provide weather warnings, such as small craft or gale warnings for a certain area, as well as fog predictions.
Docking onto End Ties
Wind blowing you off the dock end ties, plan a fairly steep approach so that you are facing more into the wind.
Bilge Pumps on a Charter Boat
Boats have two types of pumps to empty bilge water; electronic and manually operated.
Rigging
At boat shows, we see folks huddled down in the vessel’s salon oohing and aahing at the leather cushions to sit on, and at the electronic gadgets for navigation and entertainment.
Air Conditioning on a Sailboat
Air conditioning is an enormous energy drain.
How to Book a Sailing Charter
There are a few things you need to know about booking a charter.
Available Energy Stored in a Battery
You don’t actually run all of the electron charge out of a battery when it is considered empty.
Tacking and Gybing Maneuvers
Tacking when you want to sail in a direction to exactly where the wind is coming from— guess what—you can’t! The best we can do is to follow a zig-zag course by sailing at about 30 to 40 degrees off the wind...
Responsibility between Vessels Nav Rules
Every vessel has a definition of being one and only one of the below at all times. And each vessel has the ability to morph from one to the other.
Sailing Safety Introduction
Emergencies at sea extend from simple and almost funny episodes to major challenges that are extremely serious.
Heave To
Heave To in sailing is a way to stop the boat with full sails still up. You might do
