I've been getting into sailing, solely for the purpose of cruising and sailing for fun with no interest in racing. As I've started talking to sailors, I've realized that you need to gauge whether you're speaking with a racer or a cruiser. Racers will claim these are not mutually exclusive categories, because of course racers can also cruise. But racers who cruise will ultimately talk to you like racers.
Racers are, as you might expect, fanatical about performance. They will go very deep into details about optimizing sail trim and shape, and using wildly-named specialized foresails (not merely spinnakers, but asymmetric spinnakers, reachers, screachers, code-zeroes, etc). It's a bit like talking to an SCCA racer about your new pickup truck.
In fact, if you have a good grounding in the basics of sail trim ("when in doubt, let it out"), and know how to put a reef in you can have a fine time getting between points A and B in a sloop with a basic mainsail and jib.
I learned to race first and am now learning to cruise. And I’m glad I learned in that order. Cruising has a very specific set of skills that you’ll never learn racing. That stuff will be obvious and if you want to cruise, you’ll learn those skills.
But what is not obvious to cruisers is that racing teaches you how to handle your boat in many different and difficult conditions, with confidence. When you race you have to go from a specific place to another specific place and you don’t get to pick the weather. You’re often pushing your boat and are in high stress situations.
Often, cruisers will go out, when it’s nice, and turn on the motor when they can’t make their boat go the way they want it to go.
So, what happens when you’re out sailing and an unexpected storm rolls in? Because if you sail enough, especially offshore, it 100% without a doubt will happen. I’d honestly be pretty comfortable handling the boat through all but the worst weather, boat breaking weather. And even that, I would be confident in my safety gear and ability to contact support for a rescue. Because all of that is drilled into you as a seasoned racer. And I’ve been through some bad weather on the race course. I’ve had to make my boat go upwind in horrible sea state for hours on end while my crew is throwing up from sea sickness.
There are multiple occasions on which I’ve turned down sailing with cruisers because I just don’t trust that they have the skills or equipment to keep me safe should things go sideways.
Exactly right. I’ve known from when I started sailing 35 years ago that I was a racer.
Sailboat racing is amazing; it’s this incredibly complex exercise involving physical boat handling skills, teamwork, leadership, communication (in a jargon that itself takes a year to internalize), as well as physics, geometry, meteorology, and minute observation of effects (that dark patch on the water or the flutter of a telltale). All of this feeds into strategic decisions on where to position your boat and tactical decisions of how to do so.
It looks crazy boring from the outside but if you get into it, it’s an activity that is intensely mental as well as physical and requires a very broad set of skills.
I finished my first race Wednesday after a few years sailing casually. And, although it’s true that whenever there is more than one sailboat going the same direction it’s a race, being in a fleet on a defined course is much faster paced and precise. My analogy to driving is that cruising is being able to drive on empty roads, and racing is driving in traffic — it becomes about understanding the flow and rules spoken and unspoken.
I've been seeing some modern junk rig refits on the great lakes the last few years, which really gives me hope about dedicated "get there when we get there" sailors. Those things are basically optimized for chilling the fuck out. Easy to sail (entire tacking maneuver is basically just throw the rudder over and duck), easy to reef, don't heel as hard, straightforward to mend the sail or running rigging on the fly.
Only downside is their close haul is like 12º off the wind vs a bermuda rig and no one knows how to make them. The east coast (esp chesapeake) has some traditional gaff rig setups that have similar tradeoffs, like catboats. I would love to see more small production boats target this end of the "speed/comfort/cost" triangle. Currently it's like if the only bicycles available were race-ready track bikes. But sailing is already a small niche and new boats even smaller I think.
Spot on. As a racer, I can say this is mostly true. Although for me and many of the other racers I know, it's less about going deep into the optimization, sail choices, etc, and more about just being competitive. Racers don't always make good cruisers because they're always trying to go faster and push harder, whereas most cruisers want to slow down and enjoy the journey.
I was born into sailing though dad, and I know how he is about performance and ekking every little bit out of what he can (and can afford) (no huge stuff, 21ft). I mean I never let the sails go all out of trim, but I can appreciate putting it on good enough, setting the autopilot and just chill and listen to the sound of sailing, the sound of sailing in a mild summer day is peak life
This site is an absolute treasure trove of technical material on sail and hull design, with a focus on model yachts but most of the physics scales up. It covers aerofoil theory (momentum, circulation, lifting line), sail twist, downwash, planform effects, Reynolds number, hull resistance, appendage design, VMG, and more.
Lots of spreadsheets and practical calculators too—bulb shape optimization, wetted surface area, simple VPP models. If you're into sail performance modeling or yacht design, this is one of the best resources out there.
Nice to see an enthusiast/engineering site that is putting cutting egde design ideas into the public domain.
Grew up with boat builders on the south shore of Nova Scotia, and knew and learned from some of the
last people to build and crew working schooners, that were also raced, I a boy, and they proud old men. Also know current builders and restorers of blue water boats.
A few years ago I stumbled onto footage of a big hydrofoil cat that was the first boat to break the 50 knot barrier, you could tell that any celebrating was waiting and would largely be to celebrate still bieng alive, big seas, 50+kn, and quite clearly nothing but flinders left if anything broke and they plowed into a wave.,..,........they were standing on deck
If you click 'Home' it is apparent this page is actually about radio-controlled racing yachts, which unlike the HN title explains the weird scope.
Vessel design goals not mentioned in other comments: cruising requires storage space, seaworthiness, living space, will generally prioritize stability/safety, may prioritize low draft for tropical anchorages, may prioritize single-handed sailing, etc. Autonomous vessels which may require visibility, minimum height, battery storage, stealth, etc. Multihull vessels are not discussed, even though they dominate in many categories because they are generally functionally superior in many regards (speed, comfort, safety, living/cargo space, low draft) but cost more to acquire/maintain. Once you study this stuff enough you realize there's a reason why ~nobody cruises on trimarans, people without extra money avoid catamarans, people with enough money prefer to cruise on catamarans, and large seagoing ferries, military and cargo vessels with speed as a design goal are also usually catamarans.
Fun fact: IIRC catamaran comes from kattumaram meaning "two stick tied together" in Tamil, the ancient Dravidian language of southern India. As such it is one of the few Tamil roots that entered international English vocabulary. South Indian seafaring empires once dominated sea trade as far east as Vietnam. Small multihull vessels are the hallmark of the Austronesian peoples, who are believed to have spread from Madagascar to Taiwan thence taken flight to populate the Pacific Ocean. Got breadfruit?
Arvel Gentry must be mentioned, he transferred much of the aerodynamics research to sailing with an amazing series of magazine articles. He debunked a lot of faulty theories, like how the slot works, in a meticulous but approachable style.
Ugh. The slot theory lives on. The physics textbook still used at Berkeley, Giancoli, used the slot effect as an example despite … Gentry being a Berkeley grad. I sent a letter. I never got a response. However, the latest edition deleted the slot example and instead uses the Bernoulli principle yet stops short of Runge Kutta circulation.
My sailing buddies and I are always asking each other, “why is sailing dying”? Sailing is a very self selecting sport. People generally love it or leave it very quickly. We are in the “love it” camp, and we are always super excited to take people that are curious about sailing out sailing. I would strongly suggest not taking classes. Just get on a boat. It is hilarious how easy it is to find a sailor that will take you out. And if you enjoy that experience, people are always looking for crew to help them sail their boat. So I’d suggest your next step would then be that. You’ll learn so much faster going out for Wednesday night races at your local club. You’ll learn both how to sail and whether you even enjoy it. A lot of places even have a “crew seat” where you literally show up, not knowing anyone, and people see you sitting there and ask your qualifications and if they have room on their boat and are comfortable with the match, take you, a complete newbie and stranger, out sailing.
Classes make it easy feel like you’ve learned “levels” of sailing or to feel like you could rent a boat in the Caribbean. But, they hide a lot of what sailing is really about. Maintenance, rigging, de-rigging, showing up for no wind, learning the rules of sailing, etc, etc. They also miss out on one of the most amazing aspects of sailing: community. Learning from other sailors is key. You’ll borrow parts from (and lend to) other sailors. You’ll help organize races for them and they for you.
Sailing is a beautiful, beautiful lifelong endeavor that I wish everyone could be exposed to and pursue if they’d like to. Look up your local yacht club or Hobie / beach cat fleet or other sailing club and just ask if you can get a ride. Show up early, listen and do what you’re asked, be polite, stay until the boat is totally put away, and repeat. Try different boats with different clubs and people eventually.
Eventually, maybe take a class (RYA not ASA) to formalize your knowledge or fill in the gaps. You’ll clearly know what they are at that point. Eventually maybe buy your own boat, or do as many people do, just keep crewing. Truly good crew are really rare and boat owners will love and appreciate you.
There are many sailing schools around SF, but one that stands out is https://www.cal-sailing.org/ - as it's by far the least expensive and low-commitment option to get on the water, and they have dinghies in which you'll learn very fast (but also get wet). Instructors are regular volunteer club members and mileage may vary, so make sure to go out with a few different ones.
Another good way to get started is to find crewing opportunities for casual racing on https://www.latitude38.com/crew-list-home/. Many skippers will take no-experience folks out for fun. (It may take a couple of attempts to find a skipper/crew you enjoy hanging out with)
My buddy has a 36' Pearson in the Berkeley marina, sometimes we bring folks out with us.
You can also join the Berkeley Yacht Club (BYC) without a boat, it's not too expensive. There's a bar and social events, good way to meet sailors with boats in the marina and go sailing on a variety of them. They hold races in the bay pretty often, and are sometimes desperate for able bodied ballast.
Spinnaker might be great - I don't know them - but if you're in the market for sailing lessons in SF Bay I can highly, highly recommend Club Nautique out of Alameda[1].
The quality of instruction is very high, with a focus on safety and building a strong foundation of knowledge. Especially if you ever might want to charter in remote locations or sail across oceans, it's really an excellent foundation.
If you have the space the best way to learn how to sail is just buy a cheap dinghy and take it out as much as you can. While you’re looking for a dinghy just read a book on theory. Something like a laser is the ideal platform to learn on and you can go out in the bay and check out Angel island and other fun stuff like that. If you want to get more experience with things besides pure sailing then just crew someone’s boat for free. When you’re done, sell your dinghy, get your money back, and buy yourself a sloop. This is pretty much how I learned how to sail.
School is fine too but you’ll realize that you’re mainly just paying for access to the dinghy anyways. The instructor isn’t going to teach you anything that’s not in a book or that you won’t learn crewing someone else’s boat.
I never ended up on a real-sized sailboat. But, I had fun on a little Sunfish as a teenager. They are nice because you can reasonably learn to sail them over the course of a couple days, and if you flip the boat over you can probably right it without too much drama. Just don’t bonk your head.
Other people have echoed the same advice, I’ll add to it.
Take enough of a learn to sail class that you understand the basic theory —- I took one at my local yacht club.
Then, find a racing fleet! Racing boats need crew weight to help the boat sail towards the wind (so you can be useful while you are still learning), and not all the jobs require as much sailing knowledge as others (my first job was to pull the free end of the line while someone was winching in the sail).
Skippers value consistency —- the boat can’t race without a crew, so literally just reliably showing up is a valuable thing.
Cal Sailing Club is a great way to start. You'll learn more quickly on dinghies than keelboats and the skills will benefit your entire sailing career as you move on to bigger boats.
Also check out the Friday night races at Berkeley Yacht Club. Skippers always need crew so it's pretty easy to get a ride. Just hang out at the gate between 5 and 6pm with your gear and say hi!
Cal Sailing is a good way to get on the water and learn the basics. You can learn dinghies, keel boats and windsurfing. After you're comfortable with basic keel boat crewing, you can probably get a ride on a boat in the Friday night beer races at the BYC. I started at Cal Sailing and eventually raced at the Rolex Big Boat Series at the St. Francis.
Larry Ellison started at Cal Sailing and Lowell North was dinghy chair in its previous incarnation as a UC Berkeley club.
There is a great school called Modern Sailing School in Sausalito. I highly recommend taking a class from them. I took one in the past and they are great!
Will help you figure out if you are into sailing or not.
- Low-cost: If you volunteer at the Center for Wooden Boats (helping around the docks, helping with rentals, etc.), you get 1hr of boat rental for 3hr of volunteer, and you get free sailing lessons after 45hr of volunteering. Really friendly bunch! Great way to learn in smaller boats for free. Plus you pick up some skills while you're volunteering. Or you can buy lessons and become a member -- boat rental is relatively cheap here. There's also Sail Sand Point, which gets you out on lake washington on little lasers.
- If you want to get out on the sound, Seattle Sailing Club (SSC) has great instructors and friendly people. They offer most ASA courses (e.g. ASA101 over a weekend is a great introduction to sailing). This approach is more expensive, but good if your long-term goal is more "serious" sailing on the sound in bigger boats. You'll have more classroom time, a textbook, quiz, etc., and probably pick up more knowledge overall.
You can also look into Puget Sound Sailing Institute, which is a bit cheaper than SSC, but not as community oriented. More locations outside of Seattle though.
I have just started sailing in the UK. I can't recommend it enough. It's great time away from the computer in nature but still doing really complex technical tasks. The best thing imho is to find and join a local club. There are many that aren't snooty (having Commodores etc) and it's pretty affordable. Members will always be looking for crew. I really wish I had done it sooner.
Definitely recommend taking an introductory ASA 101/102/103 classes from a local school! Will help you decide if you are into it while having some fun.
Join a club. There's also facebook groups looking for crews. But i guess if you don't have experience, you kind of have to provide an incentive like contributing higher towards the common costs.
Start with dinghy sailing, there are few places in the area you can take a class, rent boats, and race. You'll meet people, and become a better pick for a crew member.
I haven't noticed many startups working on bringing modern tech to recreational sailing and cruising.
Systems aboard a typical 35-50 foot sailboat produce interesting data streams, but the data don't seem to be used innovatively or interestingly.
This makes me wonder if the market is too small compared to the unicorn-level valuations most seem to aim/hope for.
Kind of putting this out there because I'm a liveaboard sailor looking out for startup ideas and it would be amazing if it were in the marine-tech space. So any feedback/suggestions would be more than welcome.
The market is small, there are existing competitors, and things change slowly. I also suspect that there isn't much value that startup could bring. I bet there are fancy products for fancy yachts.
There is a lot of open source going on. There is OpenCPN chart plotter. There is also NMEA OneNet which uses Ethernet so should support things that radars, plus make wiring easier.
The material seems dated. Modern yachts choose to be limited by displacement speeds but aren’t bound by them. New models that can rise on plane (like a speed boat) because of advances in materials and manufacturing are starting to proliferate (small sail boats known as “dinghies” have been doing this for decades but larger boats were limited by their heft). That’s not to even go into the wide ranging use of foils, which isn’t relevant to casual sailors but are prolific in high end racing.
Racing isn’t what used to be, but sailing very much is.
There are roughly two kinds of sailors: those who care about speed, and those who care about comfort. They have almost antipodal design requirements, but both kinds are very much sailors.
At the extreme opposite, here's a terrific set of videos on big ship architecture, design, engineering, and operations. Like the RC model yachts page, much of it's relevant for mid-sized boats too.
This is amazing, is there something like this about how a guitar works?! I would love to learn the physics of stringed instruments, and then design my own guitar or violin
jp57|10 months ago
Racers are, as you might expect, fanatical about performance. They will go very deep into details about optimizing sail trim and shape, and using wildly-named specialized foresails (not merely spinnakers, but asymmetric spinnakers, reachers, screachers, code-zeroes, etc). It's a bit like talking to an SCCA racer about your new pickup truck.
In fact, if you have a good grounding in the basics of sail trim ("when in doubt, let it out"), and know how to put a reef in you can have a fine time getting between points A and B in a sloop with a basic mainsail and jib.
patagonia|10 months ago
But what is not obvious to cruisers is that racing teaches you how to handle your boat in many different and difficult conditions, with confidence. When you race you have to go from a specific place to another specific place and you don’t get to pick the weather. You’re often pushing your boat and are in high stress situations.
Often, cruisers will go out, when it’s nice, and turn on the motor when they can’t make their boat go the way they want it to go.
So, what happens when you’re out sailing and an unexpected storm rolls in? Because if you sail enough, especially offshore, it 100% without a doubt will happen. I’d honestly be pretty comfortable handling the boat through all but the worst weather, boat breaking weather. And even that, I would be confident in my safety gear and ability to contact support for a rescue. Because all of that is drilled into you as a seasoned racer. And I’ve been through some bad weather on the race course. I’ve had to make my boat go upwind in horrible sea state for hours on end while my crew is throwing up from sea sickness.
There are multiple occasions on which I’ve turned down sailing with cruisers because I just don’t trust that they have the skills or equipment to keep me safe should things go sideways.
efitz|10 months ago
Sailboat racing is amazing; it’s this incredibly complex exercise involving physical boat handling skills, teamwork, leadership, communication (in a jargon that itself takes a year to internalize), as well as physics, geometry, meteorology, and minute observation of effects (that dark patch on the water or the flutter of a telltale). All of this feeds into strategic decisions on where to position your boat and tactical decisions of how to do so.
It looks crazy boring from the outside but if you get into it, it’s an activity that is intensely mental as well as physical and requires a very broad set of skills.
mlhpdx|10 months ago
giraffe_lady|10 months ago
Only downside is their close haul is like 12º off the wind vs a bermuda rig and no one knows how to make them. The east coast (esp chesapeake) has some traditional gaff rig setups that have similar tradeoffs, like catboats. I would love to see more small production boats target this end of the "speed/comfort/cost" triangle. Currently it's like if the only bicycles available were race-ready track bikes. But sailing is already a small niche and new boats even smaller I think.
th0ma5|10 months ago
oxml|10 months ago
_whiteCaps_|10 months ago
laluser|10 months ago
lillecarl|10 months ago
TacticalCoder|10 months ago
[deleted]
stass|10 months ago
Lots of spreadsheets and practical calculators too—bulb shape optimization, wetted surface area, simple VPP models. If you're into sail performance modeling or yacht design, this is one of the best resources out there.
metalman|10 months ago
ModernMech|10 months ago
contingencies|10 months ago
Vessel design goals not mentioned in other comments: cruising requires storage space, seaworthiness, living space, will generally prioritize stability/safety, may prioritize low draft for tropical anchorages, may prioritize single-handed sailing, etc. Autonomous vessels which may require visibility, minimum height, battery storage, stealth, etc. Multihull vessels are not discussed, even though they dominate in many categories because they are generally functionally superior in many regards (speed, comfort, safety, living/cargo space, low draft) but cost more to acquire/maintain. Once you study this stuff enough you realize there's a reason why ~nobody cruises on trimarans, people without extra money avoid catamarans, people with enough money prefer to cruise on catamarans, and large seagoing ferries, military and cargo vessels with speed as a design goal are also usually catamarans.
Fun fact: IIRC catamaran comes from kattumaram meaning "two stick tied together" in Tamil, the ancient Dravidian language of southern India. As such it is one of the few Tamil roots that entered international English vocabulary. South Indian seafaring empires once dominated sea trade as far east as Vietnam. Small multihull vessels are the hallmark of the Austronesian peoples, who are believed to have spread from Madagascar to Taiwan thence taken flight to populate the Pacific Ocean. Got breadfruit?
WALoeIII|10 months ago
http://gentrysailing.com/magazines.html
CalChris|10 months ago
lasermatts|10 months ago
Did some digging and found a sailing school that I haven't asked about classes (yet) https://www.spinnaker-sailing.com
There's even a school that offers boatbuilding lessons in Sausalito -- a bit too far/much of a time commitment for me! https://www.spauldingcenter.org/current-offerings
patagonia|10 months ago
Classes make it easy feel like you’ve learned “levels” of sailing or to feel like you could rent a boat in the Caribbean. But, they hide a lot of what sailing is really about. Maintenance, rigging, de-rigging, showing up for no wind, learning the rules of sailing, etc, etc. They also miss out on one of the most amazing aspects of sailing: community. Learning from other sailors is key. You’ll borrow parts from (and lend to) other sailors. You’ll help organize races for them and they for you.
Sailing is a beautiful, beautiful lifelong endeavor that I wish everyone could be exposed to and pursue if they’d like to. Look up your local yacht club or Hobie / beach cat fleet or other sailing club and just ask if you can get a ride. Show up early, listen and do what you’re asked, be polite, stay until the boat is totally put away, and repeat. Try different boats with different clubs and people eventually.
Eventually, maybe take a class (RYA not ASA) to formalize your knowledge or fill in the gaps. You’ll clearly know what they are at that point. Eventually maybe buy your own boat, or do as many people do, just keep crewing. Truly good crew are really rare and boat owners will love and appreciate you.
I think you’ll love it.
arnarbi|10 months ago
Another good way to get started is to find crewing opportunities for casual racing on https://www.latitude38.com/crew-list-home/. Many skippers will take no-experience folks out for fun. (It may take a couple of attempts to find a skipper/crew you enjoy hanging out with)
pengaru|10 months ago
You can also join the Berkeley Yacht Club (BYC) without a boat, it's not too expensive. There's a bar and social events, good way to meet sailors with boats in the marina and go sailing on a variety of them. They hold races in the bay pretty often, and are sometimes desperate for able bodied ballast.
jaredhansen|10 months ago
The quality of instruction is very high, with a focus on safety and building a strong foundation of knowledge. Especially if you ever might want to charter in remote locations or sail across oceans, it's really an excellent foundation.
[1]https://www.clubnautique.net/school/introduction-to-sailing/
asimpletune|10 months ago
School is fine too but you’ll realize that you’re mainly just paying for access to the dinghy anyways. The instructor isn’t going to teach you anything that’s not in a book or that you won’t learn crewing someone else’s boat.
Hope you have fun though with whatever you decide
bee_rider|10 months ago
OldManAndTheCpp|10 months ago
Take enough of a learn to sail class that you understand the basic theory —- I took one at my local yacht club.
Then, find a racing fleet! Racing boats need crew weight to help the boat sail towards the wind (so you can be useful while you are still learning), and not all the jobs require as much sailing knowledge as others (my first job was to pull the free end of the line while someone was winching in the sail).
Skippers value consistency —- the boat can’t race without a crew, so literally just reliably showing up is a valuable thing.
reneherse|10 months ago
Also check out the Friday night races at Berkeley Yacht Club. Skippers always need crew so it's pretty easy to get a ride. Just hang out at the gate between 5 and 6pm with your gear and say hi!
https://www.berkeleyyc.org/racing
CalChris|10 months ago
Larry Ellison started at Cal Sailing and Lowell North was dinghy chair in its previous incarnation as a UC Berkeley club.
Goofy fun place.
stass|10 months ago
Will help you figure out if you are into sailing or not.
iancmceachern|10 months ago
There are a ton of opportunities at South Beach Marina
reddit_clone|10 months ago
As a fan of Hornblower series,I suspect most of the relevant details went over my head because I didn't understand this.
barbs|10 months ago
jasonpeacock|10 months ago
Warship: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Nr1AgIfajI
Explorer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pYqXrFx6S8
They don't cover the actual physics and processes of sailing a tall ship, but they do explain all the parts and pieces and how they connect.
Lefuz|10 months ago
The tutorial level on how to get the ship pointed in the right direction and moving out of the harbour will give you the basics.
amelius|10 months ago
Zeetah|10 months ago
I would love to volunteer on someone's race/sail boat to get some experience. I'm happy to take the ASA introductory course or ? course.
Any advice on how to move forward? I'm in the Seattle area.
anon7000|10 months ago
- Low-cost: If you volunteer at the Center for Wooden Boats (helping around the docks, helping with rentals, etc.), you get 1hr of boat rental for 3hr of volunteer, and you get free sailing lessons after 45hr of volunteering. Really friendly bunch! Great way to learn in smaller boats for free. Plus you pick up some skills while you're volunteering. Or you can buy lessons and become a member -- boat rental is relatively cheap here. There's also Sail Sand Point, which gets you out on lake washington on little lasers.
- If you want to get out on the sound, Seattle Sailing Club (SSC) has great instructors and friendly people. They offer most ASA courses (e.g. ASA101 over a weekend is a great introduction to sailing). This approach is more expensive, but good if your long-term goal is more "serious" sailing on the sound in bigger boats. You'll have more classroom time, a textbook, quiz, etc., and probably pick up more knowledge overall.
You can also look into Puget Sound Sailing Institute, which is a bit cheaper than SSC, but not as community oriented. More locations outside of Seattle though.
livelaughlove69|10 months ago
OldManAndTheCpp|10 months ago
Buying a boat brings with it dreams of freedom, winning races, beautiful summer days.
The reality is that you need crew! Serious racers will refer to their boat as their “program”, and are always looking for careful, reliable crew.
I’d say look for a “learn to sail” program at whatever yacht club is nearest you, then see if they have a club racing scene. Most clubs have both.
stass|10 months ago
This is how I started.
chaitimes|10 months ago
zardo|10 months ago
serkandurusoy|10 months ago
Systems aboard a typical 35-50 foot sailboat produce interesting data streams, but the data don't seem to be used innovatively or interestingly.
This makes me wonder if the market is too small compared to the unicorn-level valuations most seem to aim/hope for.
Kind of putting this out there because I'm a liveaboard sailor looking out for startup ideas and it would be amazing if it were in the marine-tech space. So any feedback/suggestions would be more than welcome.
ianburrell|10 months ago
There is a lot of open source going on. There is OpenCPN chart plotter. There is also NMEA OneNet which uses Ethernet so should support things that radars, plus make wiring easier.
mlhpdx|10 months ago
Sailing isn’t what it used to be.
creeble|10 months ago
There are roughly two kinds of sailors: those who care about speed, and those who care about comfort. They have almost antipodal design requirements, but both kinds are very much sailors.
boat34189|10 months ago
https://www.youtube.com/@DatawaveMarineSolutions/videos
mendeza|10 months ago
McNutty|10 months ago
stass|10 months ago
sailfast|10 months ago
mmooss|10 months ago
philk10|10 months ago
unknown|10 months ago
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