Nothing gets the juices flowing like a good discussion about a helm station. I know I am going to come off a little "manly" here but unless you have been involved in a discussion about controls, gages and navigational electronics with a bunch of guys, you may not understand this post. It's fantasy land for the control freak in the family. I have noticed lately that my wife wants to hold the remote for the TV/DVR etc so perhaps the days of male dominance when it comes to things like this are over (?)
In my family anyway, I get the choose the electronics but that is more and more a shared undertaking with many boating couples. I know Graham and Erica made this decision together. I guess my point in this post is to show you how much space we have provided for you to fill. That's like getting a really big stocking at Christmas !
Here's an image of the dash. Of note are the beautifully crafted cherry components and the Ultraleather cover over the front of the instrument panel. Aft on the wedge are the SmartCraft displays for the Cummins-Zeus engines. Brilliant bits of kit (as the Brits would say). On center the Zeus tilt helm pump and to port of the wooden wheel (not seen) the Mototron Joy Stick and trim tab control panel. To starboard of the helm out of sight here are the Skyhook/autopilot control pad and the engine control levers.
Best of all and left for you little boys and girls to fill with as many toys as Santa brings, is the navigational electronics panel. Oh what fun it will be !
On behalf of Bobby who is somewhat shy about making posts to my blog so I asked and he said it would be OK to copy and paste his questions and my answers
Bentley:
After reading the latest blog entry, I had to stare at the photo for a minute before I realized exactly where the ultraleather cover is situated (the color is so like that of the cherry in the photo that I couldn't discern the difference at first). Is this purely a design statement or does the use of a manmade fabric there have something to do with the light coming through the windshield?
I also thought it might take a right-hander a bit of time to get used to the placement of the joystick--on the other hand, nothing prevents the captain from moving a bit to port so as to be able to operate the joystick with her ( Brenda, of course) right hand, but won't the stick be behind the steering wheel? I suppose the captain would be standing during docking--I can't remember ever docking my boat from a seated position.
Bentley's answers:
The box has some lovely curves and stuff which cannot be made with wood. yes Brenda chose the materials to match the cherry. Very nice and it also tends not to reflect the sunlight coming through the windows.
The Zeus wheel is small (Cummins direction) and the joy stick is not behind it at all. What users of wheels and gears need to remember when looking at a Zeus boat is that once you are using the joy stick the other things don’t get used at all. No rudders no shifters. When backing into a slip for example standing where you can put your right hand on the stick actually puts you in a better position to see the corners from the helm through the aft door and you would be surprised to see how easy it is to use your left hand with the joystick too. We tried it prior to making this decision. It's great!
Posted by: Bentley Collins for Bobby | April 08, 2009 at 11:28 AM