Hi Scott: Every boat has tradeoffs - one of the decisions made when developing the Nordhavn 40 was that (like the 46) the wheelhouse seating would be done sitting on the helm bench, not in a separate Stidd type helm chair. The Nordhavn 40 is a true passagemaker and there are numerous ocean crossing on them - none with a helm chair. I did a leg on our ATW boat and have a couple hundred hours running 40s - the helm bench is quite comfortable and you don't miss a custom helm chair. The reality is that on a long trip you are almost always steering byautopilot, many 40 owners have a remote autopilot so you sit at the bench and steer from there. Sitting aft in the wheelhouse you acutally have a better view - the sides are not behind you as they would be if you were sitting in a chair where you could reach the steering wheel (and dash controls). For close quarter running I find it is easier to be standing up. You can pop out either side of the wheelhouse to look where you are (particularly looking aft) and you feel more active when you are up rather than sitting back in a chair. Most Nordhavns that have helm chairs - typically the 43, 47, and up - find that for docking purpose they too stand up. Note: The Nordhavn 43 was designed with input and lessons learned from our 40 circumnaviagtion and we purposely designed a longer wheelhouse to allow for the inclusion of a helm chair, even so, not all 43 owners have installed one. The helm chair then is really an amazingly comfortable perch for a long run. When it is really rough you are more secure with arm rests to hem you in and you can reach all/most of the controls - the 40 bench seat is fronted by a table which in big seas becomes unusable (stuff tips over or slides off) and so if you need to adjust something - like radar rings - getting up can be a balancing act - but is obviously doable and just about everything can be upgraded to a remote - so sitting back at the bench you just have to organize all of your remote "clickers" under reasonable control and you can change the channel on your XM radio (and volume) and monitor other "essentials". One last Nordhavn 40 thought. We have installed a foot rest on the helm bench landing of a couple of 40s which provides a bit more support/ leverage - I could email you some photos if you are interested. Regarding autopilots - this past week I was in Florida and ran into Larry Biggs who just returned from Venezuela and has put 5,000 miles on his Nordhavn 47 "Nexus". We talked about the importance of two autopilots and I asked him what he did to make sure either was ready to go. His answer was very logical. The parameters for most autopilots require different settings for headseas and following seas. You could become an expert and adjust them, but what Larry has done is fine tune autopilot 1 for headseas and autopilot 2 for following seas - a simple solution that to me makes a lot of sense. Whether you end up in a Krogen or a Nordhavn I think a true full displacement, ballasted design will provide you with a more stable platform and comfortable ride to go long distances. Both brands have large rudders and deep long keels which help with tracking and that puts less load on the rudder and therefore the autopilots. Good luck! Jeff Jeff Merrill Nordhavn Sales - California 949.355.4950 jeff.merrill@nordhavn.com > I was reading about the Dashew boat in this months Passagemaking when a > thought hit me. Done Dreamin is a 40' Nordhavn plying the worlds oceans. > Dashew talks about how important it is to have good helm seating for ocean > crossings. The 40' Nordhavn is generally not thought of as having enough > room to put a good helm chair. This got me wondering how ocean friendly > this boat would be? That led me to another question. > > Dashew talks about having redundant autopilots. While I have a fairly > simple autopilot in my Camano, I know there is one sea state it doesn't > deal with very well at all. In a following sea the autopilot can not > control the boat. I believe its the dynamics of the square stern and how > it wallows off a wave. If I direct the boat I can anticipate the wave and > start a correcting input even before the course has begun to change. Do > larger ocean capable boats have much better autopilots capable of dealing > with all ocean conditions (other than the worst of course)? Is a Krogen > much more sea kindly that a Nordhavn because of their stern shapes? Does > this sea kindly performance translate into differing requirements for an > autopilot? Does everyone agree that having a completely redundant, > installed autopilot is a requirement for an ocean capable boat, or are > spares adequate? Thanks in advance for sharing your experience. > > Scott Bulger, PUP List Administrator > Planning an Ocean voyage before turning 50 :) > _______________________________________________ > Passagemaking-Under-Power Mailing List