damaged mast wind indicator

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Hans Grasman

damaged mast wind indicator

Post by Hans Grasman »

The S/V Belcourt is docked in SW Florida in Burnt Store Marina a haven for Ospreys.
The damned birds have damaged my Raymarine mast head unit for the third time.
This time they knocked off the weather vane but the wind speed unit still records. But no wind direction reading since the vane is off.
I found the vane on the deck and it does not look like it is broken off but more like it was lifted up and out.

During the Florida sailing season I hoist a colorful plastic shopping bag up the mast and it fills up we air and keeps the Ospreys away. Although once in awhile one of them protected sobs just sits there and laughs at me until I swing the halyard at them. I also curse them in Dutch but they do not seem to understand Dutch or just do not care.

Do any of you sailors experience Osprey attacks on your vessel and what do you do to avoid them ?

I am really getting annoyed with this problem and The Admiral now refuses to be hoisted up the mast to make repairs. She also loves these birds.
Air Mobility
Posts: 47
Joined: Sun Apr 01, 2007 7:57 pm

Re: damaged mast wind indicator

Post by Air Mobility »

I had mast head work done this spring and then moved my 350 to Osprey Point Marina in Rock Hall, Md. After the move to this new marina, a week went by before my wife and I got back down to start a one week cruise around the bay. When we raised the sails for the first time we noticed the wind instrument readings were totally erroneous. Close inspection of the mast head revealed one anemometer cup missing and the head and fin of the pointer were missing. When we got back to the boat a few weeks later, I noticed a big osprey atop a neighbor's mast head. He was attacking the anemometer with great gusto. I never knew this was a problem. I am reluctant to replace the broken anemometer parts with so many nesting osprey pairs in the area. Has anyone found a source for anemometer parts? Any luck keeping the big birds from attacking the mast head instruments?

George
Air Mobility
hull 158
JerryRoss
Posts: 29
Joined: Mon Jun 27, 2011 2:02 pm
Location: Pensacola, FL

Re: damaged mast wind indicator

Post by JerryRoss »

George,

See my post titled Osprey Repellant under topic Add-ons and improvements regarding how I handle my osprey problem. As noted in the post, the threaded rod needs to be longer than shown in the photo. After that post, I changed the 12 inch rod to one 17 inches long and all seems fine. That allowed me to reinstall the Windex. Since then I've had no ospreys and no hanging of my wind spreed rotor.
Jerry Ross
s/v Coquillage
Catalina 350, Hull #350
nybor
Posts: 248
Joined: Sun Jan 06, 2013 7:55 am

Re: damaged mast wind indicator

Post by nybor »

Hi. I too have a damaged wind angle indicator. It is the Windex that is separate from the Raymarine wind instrument. I purchased a new one and when I went up the mast, I found that the original one's aluminum mounting rod is not straight but has a couple of 90 degree bends to get it away from an antenna. I looked online for this type of mount and didn't see it.

Does anyone know of these and where it can be purchased?


thanks as always in advance.

dave

NYBOR
cuthbert
Posts: 86
Joined: Fri Apr 27, 2012 1:20 pm

Re: damaged mast wind indicator

Post by cuthbert »

Rather than start a new thread I thought it just as easy to tag on the back of this one for advice.
My boat is a 2003 and in the los angeles area, which even though the prevailing wind is from the Pacific the city muck in a matter of weeks leaves the boat dirty with soot and I think that this has impacted the Raymarine wind vane and the windex over time.
I have really two questions both of which pertain to going up the mast which I am never at my most comfortable undertaking

1) The Windex, in the last 6 months this tends to jam in the direction of the prevailing wind, it freed up when sailing this weekend but jammed again when the wind dropped. If I go up the mast what do I need to dismantle this or just clean it to make it freely turn, do I need lubricant? Any advice on this is much appreciated as I only want to go up once.

2) The raymarine wind instrument arm, mine being a 2003 has what I think was called a E25018 which has a body that is a slim tube where the newer 2004/5 onwards is a E22078 which has a fatter body like a bulb/ball. It jammed a few years back and I changed the ball bearings and put it back, but it will not turn as of this weekend and I have ordered a E22078 which is a straightforward screw in replacement. The cups change size between the two and therefore wind response/transfer function. I have the original ST60+ display which means there is a cal procedure and offset to follow but can anyone advise if having done this they had an exact offset number for winsdspeed that they used, I read that it can be reduced or increased in 10% increments.

In perusing this over a beer a final question can a nozzle of any sort on a standard hose get a stream of water that can hit the mast top? Any thinking out of the box ideas to clean it from afar going forwards?
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russp
Posts: 189
Joined: Fri Apr 01, 2011 5:31 am
Location: Paynesville, Australia

Re: damaged mast wind indicator

Post by russp »

My 2 bits worth. If my Windex was sticking and I was going up the mast to free it, I would replace it 100% of the time, once the bearing has worn/frozen you have little chance of getting it reliable again.

Re the ST60, there is a guy in the UK, on eBay I think, who buys non-working ST60 instruments and rebuilds them and re-sells. I bought wind transducer off him a couple of years ago, is working perfectly and didn't need recalibrating because it had the original cup sizes.

Russ Peel
2003 C350, Hull #150
Avalon
Russ Peel
Avalon #150
Amnesia
Posts: 40
Joined: Sun Jul 23, 2006 2:26 pm
Location: Coronado CA

Re: damaged mast wind indicator

Post by Amnesia »

Mine was stuck, and I had a rigger up the mast for a separate issue.

He brought the ST60 wind-vane down, took it apart, cleaned it and lubed it...it wasn't a bearing problem, it was a grit build up problem (after 13 years).

Sorry I don't know what the lube grease was that he used. 5 minutes at most, has worked fine for the past season.
Mike Emery

S/V Amnesia
Cat350 #169
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