North Up or Heading Up?

[Grigory]

I vote for north up
If an image with small icons rotates back and forth on a small screen, when boat change course, it confuses and annoys me.

[Bbolino]

The "correct" answer is whatever orientation you are most comfortable with and best able to react to, and at 8 kts the answer might be different than at 25kts.

[sck5]

There is no correct answer. It is a matter of personal choice. I like heading up so the screen matches with what I see with my eyes. But I know others who hate that because they are used to looking at north-up maps and charts. Do whatever doesn't confuse you.

[Jpernick]

I always use heading up. That said, cardinal bouys are much easier to interpret when set north up.

To my knowledge, cardinal bouys are to only real world features the are referenced to real world cardinal directions.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardinal_mark

[SharAndy]

I've seen a # of these questions/surveys over the years and it's always appeared that most women want Course up. Men seem to prefer North up. My husband, 24 years USAF, many as a Navigator (starting with Sexton) wants North Up. Many a fight til we both learned to switch it over when the other takes the helm.....

[Redpcx]

Purely Personal.
I assume it has to do with how your brain works.
My personal preference is North Up.

[AJ_n_Audrey]

Originally Posted by rslifkin

Personally, I like radar as heading-up (as it's natural for correlating a radar target to a visible object). Charts are always north up, I can't stand having the chart rotate on me.

+1 Maybe it's my long history using maps in backpacking and the military, but I like north up except for radar. The whole map rotation thing with heading up is irritating to me.

[team karst]

Hmmm, the question is flawed. A GPS fix doesnt give you heading. Unless you have a heading sensor in use, a zero velocity situation will give an unstable picture.
If you move in reverse, do u want the chart to flip?

[jtsailjt]

Originally Posted by requiem

If they know bearings are relative to the bow, there's no reason you can't stick with the traditional relative bearings. The o'clock method always struck me as an airplane person thing.

While it's not universal, the red/green method serves the same purpose as the left/right method:

https://youtu.be/Q0yL0ddfgWc?t=472

Yes, those other ways will work but if your goal is to eliminate as much confusion as possible, it’s good to stick with the most “universal” references possible. So if my life depends on some random person understanding what I’m saying, I’ll gamble that they’ll understand left versus red, and right three o’clock versus relative bearing.

Another consideration is that lots of boaters are part timers with no formal training and little home study and to avoid collisions we need to communicate with them just as much as we need to communicate with professional mariners who would pick right up on your terminology. Using red instead of left is a proper way to describe where something is located in relation to you but it’s not the most effective way because many boaters wouldn’t immediately know what you mean.

I remember the first time I heard “give me red to red.” It was about 30 years ago and at about 2AM. I was in deep water between the Abacos and Berry Islands and was tired and being too complacent as a medium size ship passed from my right to left about 1/2 mile ahead. What I had neglected to notice was that the ship was actually a tug towing a barge. [emoji15]Luckily for me, the barge helmsman was more alert than I and noticed that I was headed for his barge tow and I needed to turn 60-90 degrees to the right in order to not collide with the barge. Suddenly I heard “give me red to red” and at first I didn’t understand what that meant or even whether it was meant for me. It was the first time I’d ever had a ship say anything to me so it was a big surprise. But it sounded loud/urgent and sort of got me out of my semi stupor and I took a closer look at my radar and saw the barge so it dawned on me that the tug skipper was trying to get me to turn right so that’s what I did and since I’m still posting here I guess you already know the barge didn’t run over me. Im still very grateful to the tug helmsman for being alert and saying something that sort of jarred me alert and likely saved my life, but at the time (admittedly I was inexperienced and fatigued but that’s not an uncommon condition at sea) I don’t think the words he chose to say were the most clear even though, once I understood the situation, they made sense. I think if he’d said something like “sailboat off my port beam turn right (or to starboard) immediately, I have a barge 2000’ in tow” it would have been immediately more clear to me than his use of red to red. I was 100% at fault and the guy saved me, so I’m not ungrateful, but at that time/place I found what he said to be a bit confusing.

[parkstone bay]

Your paper chart work - which you do carry out, don't you? - is always North up. But doing what YOU prefer has a lot of merit, even if it's technically "the wrong way". On my little MB, North up, because that 's how my back-up paper (well, plastic, really) chart is .

[edlepera]

I always like the orientation to be in the direction I am heading in.
weather dingy sailing, day sailing and crew boat sailing. easier to orient yourself to the surrounding area.
While a Naval Officer has a dictated Navigator and an assistant navigator plus many quartermasters (navy enlisted navigators).

[Redpcx]

I remember map training in an ARMY.
The test used Orienteering, which I think was some kind of sport.
We did orient the map to magnetic north for route planning, with the distances and direction penciled on the map as we calculated the route which would work.
BUT! We did NOT rotate the map as we traveled. Topo maps are printed North up, and as you travel are normally held north up.

[W3GAC]

Originally Posted by Liming II

Good afternoon,
Just wondering how everyone sets up their chart plotters. We were recently told by a professional captain (former Naval Officer) that north should always be up. All of our friends tell us they set up as heading up. Heading up seems more intuitive to me.

Thanks

Mike

Sailing for 40+ yrs, including San Diego to St Thomas and 2 yrs cruising in Caribbean then up to NYC area for 10 yrs, then down to Chesapeake Bay 99% of time I used ‘Course Up.’ Who cares where North is! I and whoever is at the wheel cares what’s ahead, matching sight line with chartplotter detail, radar…

[Sailor80]

I am a retired Navy officer and I too use north up. I have yet to see a compass that uses Heading Up.

[gregfreed]

I drove jet airplanes for 30 years, I’ve never seen anyone ever use North Up, obviously when things are happening fast intuitive is better, however after a couple weeks of 3 on 6 off 5 kts can feel pretty fast.