In association with: Technology
User guide Lessons learned from racing two-handed in a rough 2023 Fastnet race
The 2023 RORC Rolex Fastnet Race had its toughest weather conditions in recent years. Three frontal systems crossed its track, the first of which was a SW gale force eight, gusting nine from the Needles to Portland Bill. In these conditions, with only two co-skippers aboard, any equipment failures can have significant consequences as there can be little slack before you are overwhelmed by the conditions. After the race I spoke to a range of different boats in the UK Doublehanded Series fleet to find out what worked and what didn’t. The biggest failure across the doublehanded boats was the electronics. Despite some carrying out extra waterproofing pre-race, the persistent rainwater and waves found their way into the network and on most boats, electronics failed. Autopilots are critical on a doublehanded boat, especially in a long race, so many shorthanded boats carry two autopilots. On Cora the autopilot malfunctioned, probably from a short circuit in a damaged cable elsewhere in the
66 SEAHORSE
system. The pilot kept auto-engaging and trying to go hard over so it was fortunate that they had installed a breaker switch specifically for the pilot. Another boat had the pilot auto engaging whilst they were hand steering and trying to tack the boat. Bellino has a second pilot that the crew can run without any data from the network and this proved fantastic as it was merrily steering the boat at speeds of over 20kts as their primary pilot wouldn’t work because of corrupt data on the network. Red Ruby had issues with the
chartplotter after water incursion. It took on a life of its own and began creating thousands of man-overboard waypoints. On top of it all, the chartplotter turned to Polish and they subsequently had lots of grimacing fun trying to silence the alarms. On other boats the chartplotter just randomly shut off. AIS was also unreliable. Some
reported AIS data was very limited due to steep heel angles, on another boat the AIS decided to lose its cable connection with GPS and therefore they stopped transmitting. Finally,
Above: Christina and JustinWolfe came from Washington State, USA to race their SunFast 3300 Ruby in the 2023 Fastnet. They had a few issues with a
waterlogged chartplotter and the wild conditions kept both of them on watch for the first 18 hours of the race
laptop and phone chargers don’t like salty water either and charging problems were common. Knowing the electronic layout
and being able to fault-find proved crucial. Jangada ran without instruments for six hours whilst the crew considered all options, including retirement. Fortunately, time spent before the race indexing all the connections on the network meant they were able to clear the fault once the sea state had eased. Another common failure was loss
of deck safety gear. Disko Trooper had a lot of safety gear washed off the transom/pushpit by the waves. The crew concluded the standard fastenings need reviewing for strength whilst retaining quick release mechanisms. On Jangada the dan buoy jumped off its bracket and self-inflated. Black Betty had the life raft self-inflate after they had turned the boat around and got swamped by a wave, it then fell off the back and was towed for a while before detaching itself. This caused extra traffic on Ch16 as many boats called in to report it.
PAYL WYETH
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