Coming back from our last trip to Catalina we cleared Ship’s Rock and set a course for Angels Gate.  Once on course, we engaged the Raymarine autopilot and it functioned flawlessly.  We switched from Auto mode a mile from the gate and manually piloted back to our slip in Long Beach.  The next week we went to Wilmington for fuel and engaged the Autopilot for the short run across the flats.  On the return trip, We cleared the Wilmington “No Wake Zone” and engaged the Autopilot.  After about 2 minutes, I noticed that we were in a slow turn to starboard.  I set the Autopilot to manual and steered back to our previous course.  Back on course, I set the Autopilot to Auto again and after about 2 minutes, we were making the turn to starboard again.  The problem was reported to Raymarine Customer Service and their response was that the problem could be caused by me placing  something electrical or metal near the flux gate head.  We checked and there were not any power or communication cords nor any metal objects near the flux gate.  We went back and forth with Raymarine and finally called in the Customer Service people from our broker, Heritage Yacht Sales who verified my findings and they took over the interface with Raymarine.  Two weeks later, Raymarine admitted that they had a software glitch in their module that interfaced the Autopilot and Digital compass and that a factory upgrade to the software was required and were were to ship the module back for the upgrade. Three days for shipping to Raymarine, ten days for the software upgrade followed by three days of return shipping for a total of a minimum of 16 days without a Autopilot and digital compass.  Thankfully, after taking delivery of the boat, we had Alcom Marine Electronics install a magnetic compass at the helm.  

May 3, 2009      

Alcom Marine Electronics upgraded the Autopilot with the new Raymarine software and it appears to be working.  We will do a sea trial after the winds subside to make sure the autopilot still doesn’t turn to starboard all on its own.  The Electronic and magnetic compasses are reading within 5 degrees of each other with the boat at rest so will will swing the magnetic compass during the autopilot sea trial.