Affordable masthead combination anchor light and tricolour recommendations.

[Epicurean]

I know this is an old thread. A friend has a combination masthead tricolor, anchor, and strobe light that's solar powered and remote controlled. It's VERY bright. But he keeps forgetting to get me the manufacturer's name. Has anyone knowledge of something like this?

[Martkimwat]

Judging by my solar powered garden lights, unless it has a decent size solar panel at least 6" inch square, it is not going to be very bright or it is not going to last a night through, also not sure why you would need a strobe either. Might be different if you are in the tropics, but in more temperate latitudes where you could have several days of overcast, the small solar panel is just not going to cut it. As an example, I have 150W of solar on my boat which looks after all my needs in the season, including a fridge. At the moment my boat is in winter storage in UK and admittedly not ideally sited to get my solar panels facing the predominant sunlight (south) but I have one of the panels as a roaming panel. It's a 35w panel and it is near vertical facing south. My solar panels are not even coping with the battery self discharge in the last week because we have had such Sh**e weather. The charge has dropped to 95%, I've decided to put a trickle charger on just to make sure they stay at peak. My garden lights have given up altogether, they recover in the spring though.

If you want a reasonably affordable combination tri-light/anchor light, a UK company, Nasa Marine make a great little light, only has two wire to it and works by reversing the voltage to turn on either the anchor light or tri-light via a DPTT switch (on-off-on). I think mine cost £120 and it has been great for the last five years since it was fitted and hardly draws any power at all.(now costs £145) I think it included the switch as well, already wired.
https://www.nasamarine.com/product/s...e-d-mastlight/

[goboatingnow]

never quite understand the need for a mast head tricolour

[Epicurean]

I certainly understand what you're saying. However, I am in the tropics and I assume it has a decent size solar panel. It must also have a Li ion battery, which would help. The garden lights I've seen have had NiMH or (Gasp!) NiCd.
I've seen it. It's bright. Before you say never; I have friends with solar powered anemometers on their mastheads

[stormalong]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

never quite understand the need for a mast head tricolour

Visibility. Most deck mounted lights are obscured by sails and/or sea state. Masthead tricolors and much more visible.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by stormalong

Visibility. Most deck mounted lights are obscured by sails and/or sea state. Masthead tricolors and much more visible.

sea state yes, but they are not obscured by the sails as they are below the headsail

personally lights on sailing boats are so difficult to see at teh best of times Im not sure having a tricolour up high. Very few European boats have that feature, its seems a largely UK thing

[stormalong]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

sea state yes, but they are not obscured by the sails as they are below the headsail

personally lights on sailing boats are so difficult to see at teh best of times Im not sure having a tricolour up high. Very few European boats have that feature, its seems a largely UK thing

On your boat perhaps but many boats have deck sweeper jibs. The masthead tricolor is part of the international COLREGS.

Also, before LED lights boats often had three 15 watt deck lights that were replaced by one 25 watt tricolor. On a cruising boat the energy saving was significant.

As you say, navigation lights are hard to see at the best of times. Having the light at the masthead makes a huge difference..

[Martkimwat]

Originally Posted by Epicurean

I certainly understand what you're saying. However, I am in the tropics and I assume it has a decent size solar panel. It must also have a Li ion battery, which would help. The garden lights I've seen have had NiMH or (Gasp!) NiCd.
I've seen it. It's bright. Before you say never; I have friends with solar powered anemometers on their mastheads

The type of battery used is really irrelevant, as long as it has enough capacity to accept all the charge given it in a 24 hour period, and that is in turn is enough to power the lights for the requisite time in that same 24 hour period, it will do the job, the only issue there is size and to a lesser extent weight. The significant factor is whether the solar panel can supply enough power for the job required, so my submission stands. As for anemometers, the power requirements are quite possibly/likely much less than even LED lights.

[Epicurean]

Originally Posted by Martkimwat

The type of battery used is really irrelevant, as long as it has enough capacity to accept all the charge given it in a 24 hour period, and that is in turn is enough to power the lights for the requisite time in that same 24 hour period, it will do the job, the only issue there is size and to a lesser extent weight. The significant factor is whether the solar panel can supply enough power for the job required, so my submission stands. As for anemometers, the power requirements are quite possibly/likely much less than even LED lights.

I'm not sure why you think the type of battery is unimportant. You can certainly build a system where it isn't, if you wish. But for this type of light to be successful a battery that absorbs charge rapidly is necessary. It turns out Alibaba sells these lights, but I'm not convinced the ones I've seen are practical