When we were kitting out we installed a Hydrovane wind-vane on Roaring Girl. This is a very clever piece of kit, designed to steer the boat by adjusting to the wind heading. The Hydrovane is one of several types. We chose it primarily for its ease of use on a centre cockpit ketch, and also because we liked the auxiliary rudder it offers.
However, we've never used it very much. Laziness (Polly, our electric autohelm works soooo well); nerves (not trying it out with enough wind or searoom to learn its ways); bad stowage (burying the rudder too deep to get at it when we do think of it) - and so on.
So today was a red-vane day! We were on a broad reach (not RG's easiest point of sail), with a steady breeze, lots of room and only a slight swell. We finally steered with Molly doing the work! This means we're not using precious electricity to steer, and it's even quieter than Polly as the steering cables aren't working, thus also reducing wear on them. We've still got plenty of learning to do about how to get the best out of Molly, in particular managing wind-shifts. We came up to a headland and found it increasingly difficult to adjust the vane accurately as well as keeping the sail plan really well trimmed as the apparent wind increased substantially.
To other cruisers, this will amount to 'about time too'. You might be interested to see just how much stuff hangs off our stern - dinghy, solar panel, life raft etc. We also did have the mizzen down for this first time. For those of you who have read
Your text to link.Moll Cutpurse, the inspiration for Roaring Girl's name, you may be amused to notice that Molly the Hydrovane and Bridgit the dinghy are, for the first time, in this picture together!