Auto Pilot for CD 30

[Craig Soucy]

I am looking at Auto Pilots for my 1984 CD30 Cutter, which has wheel steering. I am settling in on an Autohelm 4000+ and am interested in any experiences other CD owner have with this unit, or would recommend another. Thanks/CAS



113414,2024@compuserve.com

[Tom Coons]

I am looking at Auto Pilots for my 1984 CD30 Cutter, which has wheel steering. I am settling in on an Autohelm 4000+ and am interested in any experiences other CD owner have with this unit, or would recommend another. Thanks/CAS

Craig: Is the Autohelm 4000 the one which drives from the inside of the hoop you attach to the wheel or the one that drives with a belt? I've got the one with a belt. It's been over many thousands of miles with never a glitch. Easy to set and I like it a lot. If you envision a windvane at some time in the future, you have to mount it on the inside of the wheel to leave room for the lines from the Monitor wind vane. That throws the mounting bracket for the motor out of line and requires some custom machine work. Once you balance the sails it will steer up to about 25 or 30 knots of wind -- after that it can't hold any longer and you have to go to the wind vane or hand steer. With the running lights on and the autopilot going my group 27 gel cell doesn't quite last the night through. You have to run the engine to charge the battery if you're under pure sail. Auto pilot best under power anyway.

If it's the version that drives on the inside of the hoop without a belt, get some extra gears. They tend to chew up. Autohelm supposedly fixed it but the replacement gear did the same thing after awhile. This was 5 years back on an Islander 36 so it may have changed by now.



TacCambria@thegrid.net

[John]

I am looking at Auto Pilots for my 1984 CD30 Cutter, which has wheel steering. I am settling in on an Autohelm 4000+ and am interested in any experiences other CD owner have with this unit, or would recommend another. Thanks/CAS

Craig,
We have a Autohelm 6000 with a linear drive unit on our '83 CD30. Yeah it is overkill but we wanted a below deck pilot and no components hanging off the pedestal. It only draws 3 amps MAX usually about 1.5 though. It is a dependable unit and works quite well once you learn its habits. The only complaint I have about Autohelm is parts availability since they have been taken over by Raytheon. Raytheon would rather have you buy a new pilot than make parts available for an older one. We recently had a problem trying to obtain three 1/8" ball bearings for the linear drive unit. Raytheon said they no longer made parts available for our Type 1 linear drive. They wanted to sell us a new one. They run around $2,000 just for the drive unit. Quite a price for a problem only requiring 3 tiny ball bearings. A couple of days later I located the bearings at a local industrial bearing supplier. I had to buy a box of 250. The cost was $8.50 and a trip across town to take care of the problem. Maybe Raytheon would be interested in purchasing the other 247 bearings from me for the meager price of $2,000.
At any rate the pilots are pretty good but god help you when the unit gets a couple of years on it and you need parts or help from Raytheon.
If I were looking for a new one I'd be looking hard at Robertson or else I'd spend as little as possible on any other one. You might check into Si-Tex as an alternative to Autohelm or Navico. I can tell you Si-Tex has very good customer and product support. They don't leave you high and dry like the big guys do. Good luck in your pursuit.
By the way I had a big problem with Raytheon on another matter on other electronics I have on board, even with support from Boat U.S. Consumer Help Department Raytheon never came through on that matter either.

[Craig Soucy]

The 4000+ is the the model with the drive attached to the wheel. Good thought on extra gears and overnight power drain.

I will have to look at power consumption, especially for overnight passages, which I hope to make this summer. I would have thought I have enought battery capacity, but you raise good point. I will check out power consumption.

I am running two group 24's (85 Ah each) and have considered upgrading, put have not come up with a good idea on battery location yet. Not alot of room in current location next to hot water heater. I would really like to install two deep cycle 6 Volts in custom battery box. Oh well. It will give me something to think about over the summer. New battery box makes good winter project.

I am looking at Auto Pilots for my 1984 CD30 Cutter, which has wheel steering. I am settling in on an Autohelm 4000+ and am interested in any experiences other CD owner have with this unit, or would recommend another. Thanks/CAS

Craig: Is the Autohelm 4000 the one which drives from the inside of the hoop you attach to the wheel or the one that drives with a belt? I've got the one with a belt. It's been over many thousands of miles with never a glitch. Easy to set and I like it a lot. If you envision a windvane at some time in the future, you have to mount it on the inside of the wheel to leave room for the lines from the Monitor wind vane. That throws the mounting bracket for the motor out of line and requires some custom machine work. Once you balance the sails it will steer up to about 25 or 30 knots of wind -- after that it can't hold any longer and you have to go to the wind vane or hand steer. With the running lights on and the autopilot going my group 27 gel cell doesn't quite last the night through. You have to run the engine to charge the battery if you're under pure sail. Auto pilot best under power anyway.

If it's the version that drives on the inside of the hoop without a belt, get some extra gears. They tend to chew up. Autohelm supposedly fixed it but the replacement gear did the same thing after awhile. This was 5 years back on an Islander 36 so it may have changed by now.

Soucyc@csi.com