boathead
regular
Reged: 02/06/2007
Posts: 57
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I am making decisions on buying a westerly 33 I viewed yesterday. Does anyone have any experience of the Windhunter windvane autopilot that the boat has fitted? It is all hydrolic pipes and rams, seems hellishly complicated and looking on the web it seems folk have troubles to the point that they unship them and send them back!! The current owner has never used the system in the four seasons he has owned the boat as they have only coastal hopped.
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AndersG
new user
Reged: 02/04/2005
Posts: 8
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I Have no experience of it but I did google it some time ago and did not find anyone that had anything positive to say about it, words like crap and fraud was used rather often.
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Squeaky
regular
Reged: 25/03/2008
Posts: 27
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Good Morning:
I have no experience with this unit but having had an Aries for many years and having heard a number of negative comments from others about it, I would suggest that many negative comments about this unit might be from people who have not taken the time to understand and learn how to use it. The Aries is excellent but it does require a bit of work to get it and the sail set correctly - once done it works for hours without attention.
Cheers
Squeaky
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boathead
regular
Reged: 02/06/2007
Posts: 57
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Thanks for your point, I agree that it is at least a possibility that the problems over set-up and balance may cause folk to dismiss the Windhunter. I would keep it on the boat for long enough to work out if 'we' are compatible, if I were able to get it working it would save me money and hassle. Hopefully I can agree the purchase of the boat and I can mess about with the Windhunter whilst I sail home!!
Cheers
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Chris_E
regular
Reged: 13/11/2003
Posts: 4685
Loc: Lymington
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Well I was that other owner of a Windhunter. I wish you luck.
The system worked-ish to windward but caused the boat to yaw through 80-90 degrees downwind. I spent 3 months trying different settings, sail set up, etc before coming to the conclusion that it was not fit for purpose other than to provide electricty via the towed turbine.
The problem is that when in any kind of a sea the baot accelerates down a wave and the windhunter responds quicker than when the boat is decelarting up the next wave. The result is the yawing or no steering dpeending upon whether you set the response time for going up ot down the waves, we never found a happy medium execpt in calmish conditions when it worked reasonably but at the expense of about a knot of boat speed and in calm conditions you need all of the speed you can get.
It was a shame that the designer/owner, Richard, could never iron out this fundemental problem because it had the potential to provide both self steering and power for the batteries. He was a helpful chap but believed in his product beyond its capabilites.
We have now replaced the beast with a Monitor that just works
--------------------
It ain't necessarily so.
Botton Village
Citizens Advice Bureau
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