Helm Station

Mattina is a lovely boat that needs protection from the sun. Even though we have a bimini shading the cockpit, we feel more is needed.

As we sail we have direct access to our depth sounder, wind speed and direction indicator, knot metre and a chart plotter with radar screen. Our helm station uncovered, looks like this:

MAttina Helm Instruments

The first part in protecting the instruments from the sun is the instrument covers. These get put on as soon as we are settled in an anchorage or at a dock.

Mattina Helm Instruments cover

The second part of protecting the instruments is our custom-made helm cover. The cover is made of sunbrella that matches the rest of the canvas on Mattina.

Mattina Helm Cover

You can see from the second photo, there are more items than just the instruments that need covering, including the steering wheel.

Thanks for reading . .

As we continue to get Mattina ready for the upcoming season, I’ll share the improvements we make; such as, Mattina gets a new helm seat.

Who says sailing can’t be comfortable?

After searching through my photos I found this one of Matt and Farley at the helm station (I forgot to take the before picture I’m so fond of prior to installing the new seat.)

Can you see the shape of the back rest? That’s the original back rest that came outfitted on the boat. It’s circular and a roll in the back is not exactly comfortable. You also get a glimpse of our full enclosure for those rainy days. We must have been expecting rain that day or maybe the wind was cold and we were keeping warm.

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