Boating at night

n the cabin, I changed all my cabin lights to LED with both white and red options. Both work at the dock, but the red lights in the cabin are WAY TOO BRITE to use for navigation. I found that as an option to no light, I use a headlamp with a red LED and put it on face backwards, (still bright) so I put a red bandana over it. Gives just enough light to give some peripheral vision. Also, All the lights on all the nav gear are turned down to minimum. Some don't go dark enough so they get a cover of some sort.
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There are several ways to dim LED's. some of my fixtures have a "bright and dim" switch on them--basically a resister in series with the LED on one of the legs to the LED.

How to determine the correct resister for LED lights.

You can put several of the lights in series, and you can use commercial dimmers.

I just buy the cheap LED's in bundles of 50 or 100. Put them in using #22 wire (solder connections). I have red LED in cabin fwd, aft, head over dinette and over galley, plus in the bunk. Onside on the side boxes and from above the door covering the entire cockpit in red light...Cheap and easy to do. Drill holes in Starboard, or wood (teak) the diameter of the light, and hold in place from the back with a dab of sealant--silicone works fine in these cases. You can "aim" these little LED's.

From Adorama (camera store) you can get a 24" x 21" red gel filter for $7. This can be put over chart ;plotters or lights to dim them further.

Lots of ways to "dim" a C Dory...
 
Here's one "trick" I learned one night when, due to unforeseen circumstances, I had to make a night crossing of Rosario Strait and on into a Anacortes harbor. I ended up using the bright lights on the shoreline to spot logs in the water.

This only works in calm water, but if you can find a shore-mounted light more or less up ahead, the very bright light (lots of them around harbors) forms a sort of "highway of light" on the water. I just steered directly "up" that lighted path. There's enough light in that narrow path to easily spot logs and such several boat lengths ahead.
 
Sandy, Yes, Good trick. Thanks.

Harvey
SleepyC :moon

This was taken after guiding another boat into PT Boathaven one night when they had an electrical issue an lost all onboard lights and navigation electronics. Fortunately they did have a Handheld VHF with some battery left. I found them via radar, and then let them come in close enough behind me so that I could see them and they could see me. I did pass them a flashlight and had them keep that aimed at me so I could see were they were.

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red over white, fishing at night
green over white, trawling at night
white over red, pilot ahead.
red over red, your license is dead...if aground
or
red over red, the captain is dead...if not under command

from what little i remember. :sad
 
Good on Conrad, Thanks. That is going into some memory bank. Might need super glue for it to stick though :roll:

Harvey
SleepyC :moon

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There are advantages to boating in Northern waters in the summer. They days are so long that you hardly need a flashlight and the need to boat at night is greatly reduced.
 
Peter & Judy":2z6pa2nk said:
There are advantages to boating in Northern waters in the summer. They days are so long that you hardly need a flashlight and the need to boat at night is greatly reduced.
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Due to the extended daylight hours you mentioned, we have only cruised a few times in the dark on our SE Alaska cruises & on a couple of those times when it was for several hours there was enough moonlight to see debris if traveling at displacement speed. Twice high winds came up while anchored when it was pitch black & those moves to a better anchorage was a bit diicy with the older gps chart that took awhile to get direction oriented & a good handheld high powered light making it doable.

Jay
 
I've had good luck making red night lights out of LED strips with 3M sticky backing. Even the little 12" strips tend to be too bright, but they can be cut with scissors down to 3 or just one LED and still work. I just did this for a light that is always on over my DC panel if it is powered. No need to turn on a light at night to see the switches. The light is not noticeable during the day and it stays on all night when at anchor. They can also be stuck on the top edge of the aluminum window frame in the CDory. They shine up just enough light to find something in the cabin and then turn them back off.

https://www.amazon.com/XT-AUTO-Flexible ... ive&sr=1-4
 
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