Limitations of where navigation light located?

[Sailorman Ed]

I looked thru the CG requirements for lights, lots of info about vertical distances but I didn't see anything about location for and aft. I need to mount new red and green sidelights and the best location is on the pilothouse. The bow always seems to be always getting wet, and no good location on the deck. The pilot house is the highest deck structure but is aft of the middle of the boat. And it is clear of getting tangled with sheets. They would be 8 feet apart, below the mainsail but possibly obscured by the jib in the unlikely event I am sailing at night.



Would still have the stern light and a mast light when motoring. Did I miss some requirement for location of the sidelights?
And I may yet also install a tricolor for sailing offshore but this isn't great traveling on the ICW.

Ed

[Jammer]

Rule 21 (b) says that they have to be "on the (starboard/port) side" and have to be visible in an unbroken arc from dead ahead to 22.5 degrees aft. Under 20 meters you can use a single, combined lantern on the centerline.

Annex I 3(b) says they have to be "at or near the side of the vessel" but this only applies over 20 meters.

Placement on some sailboats is problematic. For boats under 20 meters usually the best placement is a single combined lantern on the bow pulpit. Sure, it will get wet, but with modern, sealed LED fixtures it doesn't matter. Or you can use a tricolor while sailing, which opens up placement for the lower-level sidelights since they can then be placed where the sails would obscure them.

Over 20 meters the problem is that with a modern sail plan the lights must be placed low to avoid having them obscured by sails, and doing so creates a risk that they will be obscured by waves. There have been proposals to allow the tricolor for larger sailing vessels.

[Sailorman Ed]

Thanks, so it looks like on the side of the pilot house will give good visibility from dead ahead and a bit higher than I could get on a rail but with much better protection.

[Edward Bairstow]

The sides of the pilot house would be fine. The Colregs do not specify the fore-and-aft location on the side of the vessel. While smaller sailing vessels often have the sidelights on the pulpit (either separately or in combination, if less than 20m in length), large commercial vessels with the bridge and accommodations near the stern will have sidelights on either side of the bridge structure. The sides of the pilot house will also comply with the international Colregs specification that the sidelights be above the level of the deck.

If you decide to fit a masthead tricolour light, it must be wired separately because you cannot use it under power, and the sidelights and stern light must be switched off when sailing with a tricolour at the masthead. Likewise, the steaming light (forward facing white with arc of 225 degrees) must be switched off when sailing with either tricolour or sidelights and stern light.