Your essential reading/reference

[DMF Sailing]

Greetings, forum!

I'm curious. Especially perusing some of the threads on rules and practices.

What are your go-to reading materials?

Having sailed since I was a kid, but having zero acumen in arithmetic, a toddler's grasp of engineering, and the ability to retain technical terminology of a small rodent, I have to constantly study and review navigation manuals, tidal tables, rule books, and such. So that when it's go-time in Pollock Rip, I know what I'm doing, and I'm not putting anyone, including you, in danger.

So, here are my books. What are yours? Do you have books? Flambé away.

[boatman61]

A great book..
The latest and the original..

[Snore]

Gentry is the guy who helped me rely understand the physics of sailing. Once you understand the physics, you can make a boat truly sail

Read http://www.gentrysailing.com/theory.html

[psk125]

I like Dashew's Circumnavigator's Handbook. He gives informed opinions on numerous topics and includes input from other skippers who have been out there too.

[DMF Sailing]

Originally Posted by boatman61

A great book..
The latest and the original..

Loving the illustrations of the points of sail. Gets right to it! Thanks!

I like Dashew's Circumnavigator's Handbook. He gives informed opinions on numerous topics and includes input from other skippers who have been out there too.

Oh, opinions sound like this forum! Love it. I'll put it on my list. Thanks, psk

Gentry is the guy who helped me rely understand the physics of sailing. Once you understand the physics, you can make a boat truly sail

Read Gentry Sailing | Theory and Practice

Sounds like...useful work. I'll take a look! Thanks, Snore. (Not to judge a book by its cover, but that asym pretty close to broaching territory. Hold fast!)

[LLCoolDave]

A few years ago the Dashews made their cruising books available for free. A very nice gesture.

SetSail FPB » Free Books

[DMF Sailing]

Originally Posted by LLCoolDave

A few years ago the Dashews made their cruising books available for free. A very nice gesture.

SetSail FPB » Free Books

Reallcool, Dave. Thanks for sharing!

[Discovery 15797]

Good call LLCoolDave, IMHO most essential reading reference are books and other sources to learn how to read the weather patterns (incl. prognostic and synoptic charts) and the pilot charts for your specific cruising area.

#2 are US Coast Pilot books or Admiralty Sailing Directions for your cruising area.

#3 tide tables and current charts for your area.

#4 navigation rules and regs; esp. light signals if your sailing inland/coastal with lots of commercial traffic.

IMHO, books on "how to sail" will give you the basics, but sailing is a skill you learn by doing and each boat is a little different.

[Benz]

Bowditch. You can get a lot of reading done while waiting for weather. When you reach the end, begin again and catch more of the 90% you missed the first time.
"Sun Sight Sailing" by SL Seaton is what opened the door for me to sextant use. A good springboard for the basics.
Of course I always have Eldridge, if only for Cape Cod Canal times and Buzzard's Bay tides.
I try to bring the Coast Pilot for any shore I cruise. Fills in gaps that cruising guides leave out.

[LittleWing77]

Both the Royal Navy and the RYA use as a study guide.

A Seaman's Guide to the Rule of the Road - Morgans Technical Books, Gloucestershire, England

Drills, drills, drills, pictograms and quizzes...
LittleWing77

[alaskanviking]

Further offshore by John Illingworth

This should be on the shelf for anyone with a cutter rig. WW2 era period just as race rules started changing boat designs to meet rules. As such you get a very good picture of how to sail a cutter, and rigging and sail design for the cutter rig. Close to a bible for a cutter. There is some content for ketches also.

Just as interesting is the current direction modern equipment and gear is going, in comparison to those sections of the his book. The recommendations and guidance on these things is interestingly and uniquely relevent again. What is old is new again. I.E. They used steel wire for halyards and sheets and other lines for performance advantages, modern day amsteel and other stronger than steel no stretch super lines have become prevelant. They religiously use wool layers to keep warm, while Marino wool garments has boomed today.

Forewarning however this is a british book written around WW2, therefore there is a lot of references, language, and old terminology or slang that i had to go look up or research. Some of it is not used in modern british english. My copy is full of notes and highlights. It's worth your while to do so however as so much of it is relevant to today.

[Tingum]

I can’t believe no one mentioned ”Chapman’s”. I do wish everyone would read the COLREGS.

[Mike OReilly]

These are my babies:






But really, I spend more time with books like:



or

[alaskanviking]

Originally Posted by Tingum

I can’t believe no one mentioned ”Chapman’s”. I do wish everyone would read the COLREGS.

I have both.

My Chapman's is old and due to replace with the updated version.

The COLREGS I have everywhere. Have the book, have it electronically, have both the cheater slide tools as well. I have been teaching this one to small boat coxswains for a while and wouldn't leave the dock without a copy to reference. I prefer double checking the rules before telling at any idiots in the water. Not sure about the East coast, but I doubt very many people on the water in SoCal at least even know this book exists. When teaching we taught that it was best to assume they don't know what their doing or any of the rules and adjust course to avoid well in advance unless we were unable to do so.

There is a coastguard boating book, more commercial in nature I had an electronic copy of. Very detailed, thick book. I used it as a reference a lot in my coxswain courses.

[xxxxx]

This one is not strictly about sailing, but I find it useful when designing/repairing things in general.

It has a ton of information from ampacity of copper conductors, to chain size/weight/strengths, to soft and hardwood lumber grades, to bolt strengths, to first aid, to magnetic declination, money conversion rates, etc etc etc.

https://www.sequoiapublishing.com/shop/pocket-ref/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pocket_Ref