Boats, Engines & Equipment Reviews

A med kit is essential on a boat and you can get kits from the most basic to fairly advanced from a variety of sources.  Here are two that take a different approach and bring you far beyond Bandaids and gauze.  First Responder Educational Services, a Connecticut company, offers two kits for mariners.  The Traveler is a basic life support kit that is designed to stabilize a patient for about an hour, providing you time to activate some form of emergency response services.  The kit can be used by anyone with minimal training and includes respiratory equipment such as oxygen with a variety of masks, clotting pouches, gauze, dressings, splints, a cervical collar and a shock blanket.   It also includes aHeartSine defibrillator and educational materials.  The kit retails for $2495. For more advanced care, there is the Oceanic kit which includes everything that is in the Traveler kit plus tools such as sutures, catheters and syringes, and a pharmacy of over the counter and prescription medicines including anesthetics, analgesics, antibiotics, and antiallergenics including epinephrine auto injectors.  Due to the variety of controlled substances involved, you cannot purchase the Ocean kit unless you hold either an Advanced Cardiac Life Support certification or higher (physician or nurse) or a USCG captain’s license.  The company does provide for expiration notification via email and can resupply just about anywhere in the world.  This kit retails for $3795. With either kit, you can also purchase a subscription to On Call International, a 24/7 medical and travel assistance network where physicians can talk you through the use of the kits or other medical procedures.  The service is just a few dollars a day and allows for unlimited calls.  First Responder does provide first aid training at boat shows so check out their website at FRES-CPR.com for a schedule. …Read More

Sea-Doo RXT-X 260, BRP iCatch Trailer, MasterCraft X-25 all capture NMMA Innovation Awards at Miami Boat Show. …Read More

A cruising couple takes their "new" nine year old boat on a dream cruise. …Read More

One expected aspect of MIBS 2010, The Great Recession Version, is the scarcity of new models being introduced by the boat companies. One reason for this is understandable–the backlog of inventory left over from the economic meltdown that put people’s plans to buy a boat on hold. You can’t push new until the dealer network [...] …Read More

  HB Marine and Independence Green Yachts yesterday announced a partnership that will form a joint venture to develop the Independence 60 Luxury Yacht that IGY started a few years ago. The Independence 60 is billed as the “world’s first ‘no compromise’ sustainable yacht.” A combination of solar cells, hydrogen production and storage and fuel cells [...] …Read More

MIAMI—February 12, 2010—Boats.com and YachtWorld.com, the world’s most-visited marine websites, today announced a long-term agreement that will connect their comprehensive, searchable boat listings with extensive editorial content from BoaterMouth.com, a dozen of the the best marine journalists in the business. …Read More

Approximately 400,000 people are impacted by sudden cardiac arrest each year in the US.  Good CPR training has heightened survival rates in most metropolitan areas where emergency medical services can be activated and on the scene within minutes, but chest compression will not restart the heart and what are you going to do on a boat, even a few miles out?  Automatic External Defibrillators (AEDs) have recently appeared everywhere and can be used by absolute lay personnel with no training to assist when the heart enters a chaotic rhythm, typically ventricular fibrillation.  It seems like common sense for a cruising couple to have one onboard. There are a number of AEDs to choose from but HeartSine is marketing one that might make extra sense for boaters.  At only 2 ½ pounds, the Samaritan Pad is compact and lightweight for easy storage.  It has only 1 expiry date (a cartridge shelf life of 3 ½ years) and is water resistant to IP56 standards so it’s submersible.  Unlike many other AEDs, the Samaritan Pad is designed for speed and it doesn’t require anything to be plugged in or removed from a case.  It can analyze the patient, charge up and discharge or shock within 14 seconds.  Given that every minute that passes without defibrillation reduces the survival rate by 7-10%, time is of the essence.  The Samaritan Pad has a cartridge which includes the battery and the pads (with versions designed for either adults or children) and will self test every Sunday at midnight GMT to make sure everything is operational.  Replacement cartridges are available from dealers around the world and when registered, the manufacturer will even contact you via email when it’s time for a cartridge replacement.  Like most AEDs, the unit communicates with the rescuer via verbal prompts but the Samaritan Pad also has an integrated metronome to keep pace when CPR is to be administered.  Events are recorded, with the time, date, ECG trace & duration, shock delivery information and CPR intervals and are downloadable to a PC for later analysis by a physician.  The units are rechargeable, volume adjustable and can be programmed in 5 languages.  They come with a 7 year warranty and retail for $1295 …Read More

But is a boat show really a great place to score a deal on a boat, or is it just glorified window shopping? And if you do buy, how can you get the best deals and the best financing? Those are a few of the topics I took on recently for PersonalWatercraft.com. But don't worry, I didn't just buy the company line. For my answers I went to both current and former dealers, salespeople, and loan specialists. They gave me the inside scoop on credit scores, interest rates, those "only at the show" deals, and a whole lot more. …Read More

Here's an idea that's head-smackingly simple but a terrific alternative to carrying traditional shroud or stay replacement materials on a long passage.  What are you going to do if you lose a a stay or shroud?  To date, that has meant storing a very long length of wire with the appropriate end hardware to make an emergency repair to be able to make it to safe harbor.  Fifty feet of wire is heavy, hard to coil into a manageable package, takes up a lot of room and since it’s usually relegated to the lazarette or bilge area, risks getting rusted and damaged.  Colligo Marine to the rescue with a kit for quick do-it-yourself emergency rigging repair.  The Emergency Shroud Kit includes low stretch 7 mm Dynex Dux UHMWPE (that’s ultra high molecular weight polyethylene) line with a 15,000 lb breaking strength to replace shrouds or stays up 50’ long and ¼ inch thick.  The line is reportedly twice as strong as ¼ wire at a fraction of the weight.  Also included are two Line Terminators one of which is pre-spliced, 20 feet of synthetic lashing line, chafe guard for spreader ends and splicing instructions.  One Line Terminator is spliced and ready to use with a shackle at the mast or chainplate end while the other included Terminator can be spliced to the length needed. You can even connect two together in case 50 feet is not enough although Colligo is debating providing larger kits for bigger boats.   Supposedly, even a marginally skilled sailor can rig this kit in 20 minutes or less with Colligo’s simple instructions.  Here’s the best part though.  The whole thing stores in a bag 12” x 15” and weighs in at around 4 lbs.  The kit is rustproof, comes in a re-sealable plastic bag and is completely reusable – all for about half the price of traditional wire.  In use, the line can last up to 5 years although the kit is designed for temporary repairs only.  If kept dry, the kit can last indefinitely.  The Colligo Marine Emergency Shroud Kit retails for $349 for the 50’ version. …Read More

Pacific Expedition Yachts will offer Cummins Mercruiser Diesel Zeus pod drives on its PE60 Expedition Class Power Catamaran. The first hull with Zeus drives is already under construction at Pacific Expedition’s Astoria, Oregon shipyard, with delivery expected later this year. Here’s how Pacific Expedition describes the decision to offer the Zeus drives: The PE60, equipped with twin [...] …Read More