on the all round steaming cum anchor light
C'pete,
The Hella lantern has the tri-light in the prescribed separations: green - red - and white stern running light - with a seen from dead ahead separation of the red and green. A slight blank space.
It also has, SEPARATE from the tri-color combo, an ALL ROUND WHITE, on top of the combo. It is a separate light but in the same lantern. This light would NEVER be turned on while the tri-color was being used. And viceversa.
Being an all round light, and UNABSTRUCTED by mast or sails,
I have seen, have downloaded, diagrams like yours above here that show this all round white (USCG Regs) USED AS A STEAMING LIGHT ON A SAILBOAT (but with sails not rigged) when the motor is running.
Imco it would be 'more' legal' than a half mast steaming light that would have 1/3, at least. of the all round requirement obstructed by the mast it is mounted on.
And in a twilight ballet of getting the boat into its berth without running into something, no reg could possibly care if the rags are up or furled. Never know, tho.
Your series of graphics don't show this. And since the tri-color option is relatively new (what, 20 years by now?) the Coast Guard may not have their diagrams up to date. Besides the all round white steaming/anchor light may be stuck in some internal committee and is left in its fuzzy status for decades to come.
Perhaps by sailor use the added FOURTH light on the masthead of a sailboat will become written into regulation. It seems to be allowed by inference and some 'quasi-official' diagrams.
The all round white is already wired on some lanterns as a STROBE light. On the highseas, day or night, with an approaching freighter, switching the strobe on to get attention might save your and your boat's butt.
Regs might someday be rewritten to include emergency scenarios like this as emergencies. Using the strobe to get the attention on the bridge of a cargo freighter. Fat Chance! Radio contact with the freighter would call off any rescue effort or USCG notification that assitence was not needed. If that is the case.
The all round anchor light from a practical aspect has to be stacked on the masthead above or below the tricolor if we have one. Cruisers forums often mention that they can recognize their boat at night - when away from it - by their all round led.
This anchor light can also be found with a PV Sunset On/Sunrise Off feature.
Practical Sailor led nav light ratings
continued from post #71
In that post I conjectured that the P.S. tests were slightly skewerd because they left out a major nav light manufacturer HELLA.
They left out AQUASIGNAL also!!!
I was cruising around the net trying for the last time to find somebody else horning in on the lucrative led navlight market. On the whimsical Jametown site they have a video box where we can view an equally uninformative guy at a boat show changing out the old quart sized AguaSignal incandescent masthead fixture for a spiffy led replacement.... He kind of waggles the old one out and shoves the new one into the same old base! Cool! But he doesn't identify the bright new shorty. Naturally we can't find the fixture in the scramble of nav lights in Jamestown's online catalog pages. They don't sell it !
Anyway, it is the S-32 Tri-Anchor. Shipstore has it for $645,77. But you can shell out $450/460 at pyacht if you have to have one. Hope it comes WITH a base! I'm tired of looking for prices.
The matching series side lights are in the $80 range.
OK, don't you think this is strange
that Practical Sailor also did NOT include this tri-color in its Feb 2010 comparison ratings.
But they did use "for comparison purposes" the 25w AquaSignal incandescent.....yeah,
it would be hard to ignore a nav light manufacturer that's been in business since 1868!
So why in hell is AquaSignal's led tri-color light NOT included?
Well maybe it's because it has a FOURTH all round white light on it!
And P.S. wasn't interested in THAT function.
OR interested in informing their readers (who like me want ALL the information they can get right now!) that that function was even available! BAH, HUMBUG.
google> agua signal Corporation
www. aguasignal.info/ecat/htdocs/index.php?id=209
(I'm going to assume that address won't come up, so try to type into google the title just as I have it. (Home Page - Support - FAQ.)
It is Q&A page where AquaSignal nureyevs all over itself telling us what and what not to do with their old masthead lanterns, nav lights and bulbs.
For us poor sods updating AquaSignal incandescent to led.
Think I'm putting this recent Practical Sailor test into the same category as their infamous marina ooze anchor test of years ago. Their credibility for me is walking the plank.
We assume that P.S. (our only marine product, no advert, testing source) has our interests foremost. Nav lights are of utmost importance and every aspect of what is in the market should be revealed by P.S. Afterall they are doing the 'scientific' study and collecting the data for us. We assume that P.S. is testing ALL COLREG APPROVED nav lights when we study their test results in the magazine. We aren't served by P.S. ignoring without comment manufacturers with long standing reputations. Or pretending that certain available options/features like the all round aren't of importance or interest.:rolleyes:
"Badges! What badges? I don't got to show you no stinkin' badges"
Ebb we all know how thorough your research is, you don't have to take any c*&p from PS!