Need ideas for mounting radar

I have a 30' Tung Hwa Clipper sedan named Adelaide.

The mast on Adelaide is old and tired. It has stays that limit the available use of the upper deck and doesn't fit under the roof of my covered slip. The pressure it places on the upper deck is visible in the inside of my cabin.

With that said, I want to dump it and move to a different set up. Mounting it on the front of the cabin a couple feet from my head isn't something I want to do, as it is unsightly and too close to my head.

What I am thinking is some sort of telescoping pole mount that can be placed along the port side, upper railing of my boat. This would allow me to raise it up 6-8' when in use, then lowered down to 3-4' when not in use. Is there such a thing? If not, what other ideas might you have?

Do you have a flybridge?

Adelaide said:

I have a 30' Tung Hwa Clipper sedan named Adelaide.

The mast on Adelaide is old and tired. It has stays that limit the available use of the upper deck and doesn't fit under the roof of my covered slip. The pressure it places on the upper deck is visible in the inside of my cabin.

With that said, I want to dump it and move to a different set up. Mounting it on the front of the cabin a couple feet from my head isn't something I want to do, as it is unsightly and too close to my head.

What I am thinking is some sort of telescoping pole mount that can be placed along the port side, upper railing of my boat. This would allow me to raise it up 6-8' when in use, then lowered down to 3-4' when not in use. Is there such a thing? If not, what other ideas might you have?

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If you want to keep the trawler look, that leaves out the radar arch, the Californians have a hinged aluminum mast that is mounted to the roof of the aft cabin and supported by a bracket on the lip of the flybridge roof. It only needs stays for support if you attach the boom and use it to lift. Otherwise it's self supporting. Pull the stainless pin and it tips back easily.
Larry B

ben2go said:

Do you have a flybridge?

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Yep, you can see it in my pic to the left. It's similar to a CHB (Montery Jack), but don't have the aft cabin. I have a large upper helm area with railing all the way around.

Edelweiss said:

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If you want to keep the trawler look, that leaves out the radar arch, the Californians have a hinged aluminum mast that is mounted to the roof of the aft cabin and supported by a bracket on the lip of the flybridge roof. It only needs stays for support if you attach the boom and use it to lift. Otherwise it's self supporting. Pull the stainless pin and it tips back easily.
Larry B

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That's similar to my Dad's set up on his CHB. I don't have the Aft cabin. Here is brochure of my boat MV Intrinsic. That sister ship (Intrinsic), has a much better mast than mine, even though Intrinsic is a couple years older than Adelaide. Anyway, Thanks for the replies.

Adelaide said:

Yep, you can see it in my pic to the left. It's similar to a CHB (Montery Jack), but don't have the aft cabin. I have a large upper helm area with railing all the way around.

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Remember that radar signals are bad for your health.That's why I ask.I couldn't tell for sure from your pic.Edelweiss pretty much said what I was thinking.

Edelweiss said:

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If you want to keep the trawler look, that leaves out the radar arch, the Californians have a hinged aluminum mast that is mounted to the roof of the aft cabin and supported by a bracket on the lip of the flybridge roof. It only needs stays for support if you attach the boom and use it to lift. Otherwise it's self supporting. Pull the stainless pin and it tips back easily.
Larry B

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ben2go said:

Remember that radar signals are bad for your health.That's why I ask.I couldn't tell for sure from your pic.Edelweiss pretty much said what I was thinking.

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Thanks, that's exactly why I don't want to mount it in the front of the upper cabin, right above the lower helm. I see that all too often.

Sail Boats often

Sail boats often have a pole mount that is a simple 3" stainless tube and base plate that they mount on their aft deck that stands about 6' above the deck. You could build one with a hinged base plate that could be easily laid down on the deck.

Adelaide said:

Thanks, that's exactly why I don't want to mount it in the front of the upper cabin, right above the lower helm. I see that all too often.

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You're welcome.We have the same thinking on radar,I believe.I see that too and it kind of bothers me.Most people only use radar in really fowl weather and are usually inside,not on the flybridge.What about the boat next door?Couldn't that possibly cause issues for them if the radar is at the same height as the occupants?I don't know, so I would rather see them high.

ben2go said:

You're welcome.We have the same thinking on radar,I believe.I see that too and it kind of bothers me.Most people only use radar in really fowl weather and are usually inside,not on the flybridge.What about the boat next door?Couldn't that possibly cause issues for them if the radar is at the same height as the occupants?I don't know, so I would rather see them high.

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If you're referring to Monterey Jack, his radar is well above his head, that pic looks deceiving due to the canvas and my huge mast. With that said, he operates (as I do) from the lower helm until he goes to dock it.

Adelaide said:

If you're referring to Monterey Jack, his radar is well above his head, that pic looks deceiving due to the canvas and my huge mast. With that said, he operates (as I do) from the lower helm until he goes to dock it.

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I wasn't referring to any specific boat,just a few I have seen with them mounted right above the forward windshield.

In today's world, not all radars are the same. I certainly agree that the "typical" radomes do need to be given a wide berth, but the new broadband radars (only Simrad & Lowrance to my knowledge) are apparently harmful emissions free.

Our Ennos Sapphire 32 has essentially the same upper deck arrangement as Intrinsic/Adelaide and we installed a 7' aluminum mast at the stern end of our upper deck last year. It has a base plate of about 15" square (I'm guessing) and is attached to the stern rail (about 30" high). As you can see in the attached photos, we have a Furuno 4KW antenna on top, with the LED anchor light, plus two wings for the GPS & weather station antennae. The mast was about $725 CDN in 2011.

We have a 6'4" son in law and we calculated that the radar beam would pass over his head if he was standing at the helm.

And for fun I've also included a photo of us rafted to your earlier referenced MV Intrinsic - a very nice vessel!

Well, sorry, but the system won't let me post photos this AM so I'll send them later.

Conrad said:

In today's world, not all radars are the same. I certainly agree that the "typical" radomes do need to be given a wide berth, but the new broadband radars (only Simrad & Lowrance to my knowledge) are apparently harmful emissions free.

Our Ennos Sapphire 32 has essentially the same upper deck arrangement as Intrinsic/Adelaide and we installed a 7' aluminum mast at the stern end of our upper deck last year. It has a base plate of about 15" square (I'm guessing) and is attached to the stern rail (about 30" high). As you can see in the attached photos, we have a Furuno 4KW antenna on top, with the LED anchor light, plus two wings for the GPS & weather station antennae. The mast was about $725 CDN in 2011.

We have a 6'4" son in law and we calculated that the radar beam would pass over his head if he was standing at the helm.

And for fun I've also included a photo of us rafted to your earlier referenced MV Intrinsic - a very nice vessel!

Well, sorry, but the system won't let me post photos this AM so I'll send them later.

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Thanks Conrad, I am very interested in seeing your set up. This is very similar to what I would like to do.

Maybe if I load them one at a time...

Two...

Three....sorry about the previous photo falling over.

Thanks again Conrad. Intrinsic is a very nice vessel, I would love for Adelaide to look like that some day (long way to go). Is your mast made of Aluminum? How heavy is it? Did a yard do it custom for you? That's a nice set up at a very good price.

ben2go said:

.Most people only use radar in really fowl weather and are usually inside,not on the flybridge.

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I have the radar on whenever operating the boat, if nothing more than to practice interpreting the radar display as well as to exercise the system, even in the marina while berthed.

Adelaide said:

Thanks again Conrad. Intrinsic is a very nice vessel, I would love for Adelaide to look like that some day (long way to go). Is your mast made of Aluminum? How heavy is it? Did a yard do it custom for you? That's a nice set up at a very good price.

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I'll pass your comment on to Intrinsic's owner. He keeps her in a boathouse, which really helps.

Yes, the mast is aluminium, and although I don't know its weight, it is easily carried in one hand. It was custom made in Campbell River by Coast Industrial Propeller; I was very happy with the workmanship, price, and timeliness of the build. It was made out of marine quality aluminum, whatever that is.

Incidentally the 7' mast replaced a 4' stainless mast, which was MUCH heavier.

Conrad said:

I'll pass your comment on to Intrinsic's owner. He keeps her in a boathouse, which really helps.

Yes, the mast is aluminium, and although I don't know its weight, it is easily carried in one hand. It was custom made in Campbell River by Coast Industrial Propeller; I was very happy with the workmanship, price, and timeliness of the build. It was made out of marine quality aluminum, whatever that is.

Incidentally the 7' mast replaced a 4' stainless mast, which was MUCH heavier.

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I also meant to say that the rational for having the radome so high is that we always have the radar on for familiarity, judging tracks of multiple vessels in poor/strange light, and for the occasional night run (arriving after dark etc.). I would only want to be upstairs during a night run.

Mast

Here is a photo of our boat inside the boathouse with the mast folded down to its horizontal resting position. It has two one inch stainless rod supports aft that sit in base plates with one bolt and nut attached when raised for support. There are photos on our website at www.rochepoint.ca with the mast up.
The mast is about a 40lb lift from the height of your waist, becoming a lot less as it rises. Made of aluminium with epoxy paint. Works great, just wish the house opening was a foot taller and it could stay up

rochepoint said:

Here is a photo of our boat inside the boathouse with the mast folded down to its horizontal resting position.....Made of aluminium with epoxy paint...

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It looks great! What prep did you do for the mast, what epoxy paint did you use and how did did you apply it? We're getting ready to paint our mast and boom.

Sorry, the previous owner had it made in Vancouver to replace the wooden one.

Here at Topsail beach we have a swing bridge with only about 13ft clear on mid tide, there are a few local boats that have the Hinged mount. it looked like a 3 1/2 inch pipe cut in half about 3 feet tall and a base plate with a 3 inch aluminum pole as the mounting pole. has a Pin they pull the pin lean the radar back or forward depending on the boat to a rest drive under the few low bridges we have around here.

The transmission emmisions from the typical radar used on recreational boats won't hurt you unless you hold your head hard against the side of the radome with the antenna transmitting and hold it there for a solid week. I've heard this not only from the very experienced marine electronics dealer we use but also the folks I've talked to about radar at my employer (Boeing).

That said, better safe than sorry. While we never run the boat from the flying bridge (nothing to do with the position of the radar) we don't let guests go up on the flying bridge while the radar is transmitting, or if they want to go up and we don't need the radar, we turn it off. But while I don't recommend a flying-bridge face mount for a radar antenna for several reasons, emissions isn't one of them.

Flying-bridge face mounts are pretty common on older boats like ours because they have solid wood masts and the antenna cables for the older generation radar sets were pretty thick. So they could not easily be run down inside the mast. The flying bridge mount makes connecting the antenna to the display unit very easy.

But the position of a radome on the flying bridge face is actually quite aways above the heads of people in the main cabin. In fact it's higher over the heads of the people in the main cabin than the antenna on the typical radar arch is over the heads of people on a flying bridge on boats the size of ours. The only way to get in the beam of our antenna is for a tall person to stand upright on the end of our bow pulpit and even then I'm not sure he'd be in the beam.

A flying bridge face mount has two advantages but they do not outweigh the one main disadvantage. So I don't recommend them for a new installation if another option exists, which is almost always the case.

In additon to the typical mast mount, I've seen radomes mounted on poles of various lengths--- stainless, aluminum, fiberglass, PVC, and even wood--- attached to the flying bridge deck. An arrangment like this could easily be made foldable for a boathouse.

Marin said:

The transmission emmisions from the typical radar used on recreational boats won't hurt you unless you hold your head hard against the side of the radome with the antenna transmitting and hold it there for a solid week. I've heard this not only from the very experienced marine electronics dealer we use but also the folks I've talked to about radar at my employer (Boeing).

That said, better safe than sorry. While we never run the boat from the flying bridge (nothing to do with the position of the radar) we don't let guests go up on the flying bridge while the radar is transmitting, or if they want to go up and we don't need the radar, we turn it off. But while I don't recommend a flying-bridge face mount for a radar antenna for several reasons, emissions isn't one of them.

Flying-bridge face mounts are pretty common on older boats like ours because they have solid wood masts and the antenna cables for the older generation radar sets were pretty thick. So they could not easily be run down inside the mast. The flying bridge mount makes connecting the antenna to the display unit very easy.

But the position of a radome on the flying bridge face is actually quite aways above the heads of people in the main cabin. In fact it's higher over the heads of the people in the main cabin than the antenna on the typical radar arch is over the heads of people on a flying bridge on boats the size of ours. The only way to get in the beam of our antenna is for a tall person to stand upright on the end of our bow pulpit and even then I'm not sure he'd be in the beam.

A flying bridge face mount has two advantages but they do not outweigh the one main disadvantage. So I don't recommend them for a new installation if another option exists, which is almost always the case.

In additon to the typical mast mount, I've seen radomes mounted on poles of various lengths--- stainless, aluminum, fiberglass, PVC, and even wood--- attached to the flying bridge deck. An arrangment like this could easily be made foldable for a boathouse.

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Very true...I asked at a Furuno Technician school I attended for several years and they said the same...you'd have to put your head in the Radome or keep ducking the open array for many moons before the radiation would affect you.

With that being said i have a steel plate on the Port side of my head and 9 screws, So i think ill avoid any of the radar i can mounted mine 36 inches above the cabin roof, No flybridge to worry about.

I believe Forespar makes a gimbaled radar mast. Not necessarily needed for trawlers (unless you're in some rolly beam seas), but it might be a solution.

Dwyer Aluminum Mast Company allows you to design your mast and runs a couple hunderd buck unles you a disco light and speakers.

https://www.dwyermast.com/Default.asp

ben2go said:

Most people only use radar in really fowl weather ...

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Ignoring the opportunity for a bird joke, I will point out that Rule 7 of the ColRegs says:
This is generally interpretted to mean that, if you have an operational radar, it must be "in use".

I know this is a very anal thing to point out, but I think it's worth knowing "the rules" even if you decide not to follow them.