Nautitech 44 Open: Sailsense Nonsense!!

We took possession of our Nautitech 44 Open Catamaran in April 2024 in La Rochelle. It was equipped with Sailsense.

Maybe I am just unlucky but I have not had good experience with Sailsense. This is not a great report on the product, but I must give a shout out to Matt from Sailsense support. Without his help, I would have thrown the system overboard.

How Sailsense markets their product

SailSense boat monitoring offers several key value propositions for boat owners and operators:

1. **Real-Time Monitoring:** SailSense provides live data on various aspects of the boat’s performance and condition, such as engine health, fuel levels, battery status, and more. This helps owners stay informed about their vessel’s status at all times.

2. **Preventative Maintenance:** By continuously monitoring critical systems and components, SailSense can alert users to potential issues before they become serious problems. This proactive approach helps prevent costly repairs and reduces downtime.

3. **Enhanced Safety:** SailSense can provide alerts for unusual or dangerous conditions, such as low battery levels or engine malfunctions. This early warning system can be crucial for maintaining safety on the water.

4. **Remote Access:** Users can access their boat’s data from anywhere through a mobile app or web interface. This is particularly useful for monitoring the boat while it’s docked or even when it’s in a different location.

5. **Data Insights:** SailSense often includes analytics and reporting features that help users track performance over time, optimize their boat’s efficiency, and make informed decisions about maintenance and usage.

6. **Convenience:** With SailSense, boat owners don’t need to manually check various systems or rely on periodic inspections. The system automates data collection and provides actionable insights, saving time and effort.

7. **Integration:** SailSense can integrate with other onboard systems and technologies, offering a comprehensive view of the boat’s operations and making it easier to manage various aspects of the vessel.

Overall, SailSense aims to enhance the boating experience by offering peace of mind, convenience, and improved management of the boat’s performance and condition.

Have I sold you on this product?

Sailsence Components

You have to pay 300 Euros/year to get the remote monitoring feature (via dedicated cell receiver). Without that you get tank monitoring, engine battery voltage and soft switches (read on for why this is not good in my opinion).

My experience

BVI Charter 2023 Nautitech 44

Prior to getting our own Nautitech 44, we chartered a sister ship in BVI. Three days into the charter most of the electrical systems stopped working. Fortunately, we were at anchor. Turns out that the Sailsense system shut down. We found out that the house batteries dropped to 20% (there was a second problem on that boat in that the SuperB battery monitor was flakey). We started the generator and charged the batteries, but still the critical dc systems were off! Sailsense switches were not responding. We had a training skipper on board so he called the charter company for advise. He was told that there was nothing that they could do Sailsense would have to remotely access the system (from Europe) to diagnose the problem. The solution was to bypass the system by moving 5 cable connectors in each hull. We did this and completed the rest of the trip with manual switches.

Our 2024 Nautitech 44 Open

We bought a 2024 Nautitech 44 and picked it up from La Rochelle in April. We are now in Sardinia.

About 3 weeks ago Sailsense Tank sensors started giving in correct readings for some of the tanks. I contacted our broker in Vancouver and they started an email thread with Sailsense in Europe. First they remotely accessed the system and did a software update. The net of that was that all sensors stopped giving the correct readings. IE all tank levels and the battery monitor.

A few days later some of the soft switches started playing up for example I could not turn off the chart plotter! Could not turn on lights, etc.

The solution to this is to execute the emergency bypass. It turns out that this was not as simple as it seems. There are 10 connectors that have to be switched. The connectors that Nautitech use are very poor quality screw lock connectors. Three of them were cross threaded and it was extremely hard to loosen them.

The next suggestion was to replace the microcontroller board in each of the Powerrail units. These were shipped from Belgium to Sardinia. I installed them (easy for me as I happen to be an Electronic Engineer). Matt from sailsense support did an update and everything returned to normal.

Conclusion

I can see some value in Sailsense for a charter owner as it allows them to monitor the systems on the boat and the boat position remotely (as long as the boat is in range of cell coverage). But for an owner who lives on a boat, they are unlikely to pay 300 Euros a year to monitor their boat remotely! As an owner what you do get are two additional points of failure:

1. Soft switches (software controlled switches) on critical systems like lights, pumps and Chart plotter/Autopilot

2. Cheap connectors that are hard to undo and do not seat properly, feeding all DC systems on the boat.
   

Nautitech, if you are listening, please please make Sailsense an option on your boats. It is not something that anyone doing ocean cossings would want or need. Real switches work just fine and they are already on the boat for "emergency bypass". There are also better tank and battery monitors out there. Ones that can be remotely monitored for free if you have WiFi on your boat. And these days everybody has internet.