The earlier you order, the higher the discount you can get on ordering your system:

• 30%* off for ordering 3 months in advance
• 15% off for ordering 2 months in advance
• 10% off for ordering 1 month in advance

* June 2013 is the last oportunity for a 30% discount. After June ordering 3 months in advance gets you a 25% discount

Here is the schedule of what discount you get when ordering your system and making the down payment in a particular month:

So if you order and make the down payment in December, your system is shipped in the April batch and you get a 30% discount.

* June 2013 is the last opportunity to order at 30% discount, after that the highest discount will be 25%

The batched delivery discount can only be used for standard self steering systems as they can be ordered from the webshop, including non custom mounting parts.

Everything else, like a wheel adaptor, shipping and customisation can not be purchased with the discount.

Customisation may not be possible to be delivered in the batched delivery months. In that case your system will either be shipped without customisation (which will be sent later) or in different month, together with the customisation, depending on options and your preferences.

No.

The down payment that you make to be able to order a system for batched delivery is non refundable.

However, you can use the down payment on any order from the Mister Vee webshop within 24 months after the month your system was due to be delivered.

The difference in immediate delivery and batched delivery comes from your payment.

To use the batched delivery discount you make a down payment of € 50.-- before the end of the month.
You will be notified when your system is (almost) ready so you can pay the remainder.

After the remainder has been received your system is shipped.

Mister Vee self steering systems are made in batches, in the most efficient sequence. These batches are shipped in April, July and October.
Shipments are in order of payment. When the system is shipped it usually takes no more than a week to arrive.

If parts are in stock or can be easily be made or ordered, you can also order for delivery in other months.
Including shipping your system will normally be at your door in about 2-3 weeks after payment has been received.

As part of the order process you will receive two invoices:

• A pro forma invoice
• A complete invoice

The complete invoice is a commercial document that lists the products and other items like shipping that you need to pay or in the case of purchasing from Mister Vee, have paid for. The complete invoice complies with the rules the Netherlands revenue service has stated.

The proforma invoice has the same contents as the complete invoice but does not have an invoice date.

The pro forma invoice is issued so that you have an overview of your planned purchase and the details you need to make the payment.
When your purchase is shipped, the complete invoice is included with the shipment or sent separately. The complete invoice mentions the invoice date, which marks the start of your warranty.

Is available here

Currently we offer the following payment options:

• iDEAL
• Visa & MasterCard
• Maestro
• Mister Cash
• Giropay
• DIRECTebanking

These payments are handled by Multisafepay, www.multisafepay.com

You will receive a payment request by email when your payment is due. This email includes a link that takes you to the Multisafepay website.
There you can pay in euro (€) and if needed this amount will be converted to your own currency.

A boat with a centre cockpit requires longer steering lines and more guide blocks than a boat with a normal cockpit.
This can easier lead to more stretch and less responsive steering.

Combining that with wheel steering kan make things even more complicated.

On a wheel steered boat there often is a reduction between the wheel and the rudder.

If that reduction is done with hydraulics, Mister Vee do not offer self steering for your boat.
The hydraulics have too much internal friction for a standard servo pendulum system to overcome.

If your boat has a connection for an emergency tiller that can be used for windvane steering, that is by far the easiest option. The systems from Mister Vee require a tiller of about 35 cm (just over 1') and if it would make things easier, it can even point to the rear of the boat.

If there is no E-tiller, then a wheel adapter is required. This is connected to the centre of the steering wheel and the steering lines are connected to the adapter. Mister Vee do not offer such an adapter.

No.

The servo pendulum systems that are on offer from Mister Vee can not overcome the internal friction of a hydraulic transmission of steering input.

Only auxiliary rudder type systems, which Mister Vee do not offer, will do in this situation.

The best advice would be to remove the ladder, then fit self steering, then find a new solution for the boarding the boat, either by relocating the old ladder or fitting a new one.

Trying to combine self steering with an existing ladder almost always means much more work to fit, less satisfying performance or use of the self steering system and more difficult use of the ladder.

On a wheel steered boat there often is a reduction between the wheel and the rudder.

If that reduction is done with hydraulics, Mister Vee do not offer self steering for your boat.
The hydraulics have too much internal friction for a standard servo pendulum system to overcome.

If your boat has a connection for an emergency tiller that can be used for windvane steering, that is by far the easiest option. The systems from Mister Vee require a tiller of about 35 cm (just over 1') and if it would make things easier, it can even point to the rear of the boat.

If there is no E-tiller, then a wheel adapter is required. This is connected to the centre of the steering wheel and the steering lines are connected to the adapter.

You may be wondering if windvane self steering will work on your boat. What weight will work, or what length?
Well, neither weight nor length are used as a general guideline.

Servo pendulum self steering systems were designed to take over the steering from a human helmsman. That means that the forces and movement that need to be generated by the system are comparable.

That leads to a two-part answer.

If your boat has tiller steering, and the boat can be properly trimmed so that you do not have to fight the tiller to keep the boat on course, than a servo pendulum system like the ones on offer from Mister Vee should have no problem to do the same.

On a wheel steered boat there often is a reduction between the wheel and the rudder. If that reduction is too high it may be difficult or even impossible to set up self steering. However, if there is an option of connecting the self steering system to an emergency rudder, things get easier.
There is a separate FAQ about wheel steering.

Windvane self steering can not cope with constant acceleration followed by slowing down. Constant acceleration and slowing down results in a big fluctuation in apparent wind direction.
This results in a zig-zag course.

As a result satisfaction can not be guaranteed.

A boat with a centre cockpit requires longer steering lines and more guide blocks than a boat with a normal cockpit.
This can easier lead to more stretch and less responsive steering.

Combining that with wheel steering kan make things even more complicated.

On a wheel steered boat there often is a reduction between the wheel and the rudder.

If that reduction is done with hydraulics, Mister Vee do not offer self steering for your boat.
The hydraulics have too much internal friction for a standard servo pendulum system to overcome.

If your boat has a connection for an emergency tiller that can be used for windvane steering, that is by far the easiest option. The systems from Mister Vee require a tiller of about 35 cm (just over 1') and if it would make things easier, it can even point to the rear of the boat.

If there is no E-tiller, then a wheel adapter is required. This is connected to the centre of the steering wheel and the steering lines are connected to the adapter. Mister Vee do not offer such an adapter.

No.

The servo pendulum systems that are on offer from Mister Vee can not overcome the internal friction of a hydraulic transmission of steering input.

Only auxiliary rudder type systems, which Mister Vee do not offer, will do in this situation.

Self steering systems are designed to be used when the boat is going forward. But what happens when you (need to) reverse the boat?

With a servo pendulum, the blade will be unstable and will want to swing to the side. If it can do so freely then there is no problem. It will float to the surface and will hardly affect the boats manouvering.

But it is very different when the pendulum rudder can not float to the surface freely. The swing can be limited by design, like with monitor, Aries end Beaufort self steering systems, or by set-up, for instance the steering lines do not allow a full swing.

If the swing is limited by design, there will be a slight pull to the side that needs to be compensated the oposite way.
If the swing is limited by the steering lines VERY BIG LOADS may act upon parts of the steering line guidance which can cause damage or dislocation to the mounting.
Proceed bacwards with caution.
Contact Mister Vee for advice.

On a wheel steered boat there often is a reduction between the wheel and the rudder.

If that reduction is done with hydraulics, Mister Vee do not offer self steering for your boat.
The hydraulics have too much internal friction for a standard servo pendulum system to overcome.

If your boat has a connection for an emergency tiller that can be used for windvane steering, that is by far the easiest option. The systems from Mister Vee require a tiller of about 35 cm (just over 1') and if it would make things easier, it can even point to the rear of the boat.

If there is no E-tiller, then a wheel adapter is required. This is connected to the centre of the steering wheel and the steering lines are connected to the adapter.

You may be wondering if windvane self steering will work on your boat. What weight will work, or what length?
Well, neither weight nor length are used as a general guideline.

Servo pendulum self steering systems were designed to take over the steering from a human helmsman. That means that the forces and movement that need to be generated by the system are comparable.

That leads to a two-part answer.

If your boat has tiller steering, and the boat can be properly trimmed so that you do not have to fight the tiller to keep the boat on course, than a servo pendulum system like the ones on offer from Mister Vee should have no problem to do the same.

On a wheel steered boat there often is a reduction between the wheel and the rudder. If that reduction is too high it may be difficult or even impossible to set up self steering. However, if there is an option of connecting the self steering system to an emergency rudder, things get easier.
There is a separate FAQ about wheel steering.

A lot of boats have equipment mounted on the transom close to where the self steering unit needs to be.

Experience has shown that it is easier to remove this equipment and then mount the windvane self steering and then remount the other equipment.

But if you have some equipment that is really difficult to move somewhere else, please send us an email so we can have a look at the options.

Windvane self steering can not cope with constant acceleration followed by slowing down.

When the boat accelerates to a significantly higher speed, the direction of the apparent wind changes. The windvane will steer the boat away from the wind, changing the total balance of boat and windvane.

The boat can then easily lose power from the sails and the system starts to steer back in to the wind.

This means that it may not be possible to steer an ultra light displacement boat or multi hull.

Especially on fast accelerating boats this will lead to unsatisfying steering. This is why we will not guarantee satisfaction when you install a windvane self steering system to a multi hull or a boat that has the ability to plane.

Use headless Vee and a simple tiller pilot for this purpose.

If you have a (very) small boat you may wonder if it can be useful to set up a windvane self steering system.

Usually that will depend on two things:

• The kind of sailing you do
• How windvane self steering compares to the alternatives

If you never go sailing for more than two hours then for most it would be pointless. But if you always get too tired when you sail longer that 2 hours but you actually would like to go futher, then windvane self steering my be the ticket to Vreedom.

Small boats are often very lively which means that when you leave the tiller the boat immediately goes somewhere you do not want it to go. That often means that you can not feed yourself or get enough to drink. Also, sitting at the helm, in the same position, for hours on end makes you tired.

Self steering can change all that, which opens up possibilities to go where you could not go before.

But is windvane self steering the most practical? Most sailors turn to an autopilot first. And on short trips that is often a good choice.

But you do need enough power from the boats battery to be able to keep the auto pilot going. And that is often where smaller boats have a problem, especially on longer trips.

If the wind picks up, an autopilot consumes more power. And on a small boat that can amount to something like 70% of the daily power consumption! Draining the battery can break it.

With windvane self steering you do not worry about power consumption.

The light weight Mister Vee self steering systems offer the best alternative to an autopilot, especially on a smaller boat!

From the start the Mister Vee self steering systems were designed to be light weight. But how light is light?

There are brands that claim to offer "light weight" but do not mention the actual weight anywhere. Or their claim to light weight dates back to the 1980's.

Let there be no doubt. Mister Vee offer the lightest self steering systems ever!

The standard version of Mr. Vane weighs just over 7.5 kgs or 16 lbs.
The standard version of Y&B weighs just over 10 kgs or 22 lbs. This is also the lightest system ever. How?

To compare the two correctly they need to offer the same. As Mr. Vane is aimed at smaller boats than Y&B, comparing them side by side requires heavier parts on Mr. Vane.
This means that Mr. Vane should have the long pendulum rudder, the long pendulum rudder tube and the complete mounting kit.

If you then were to mount Mr. Vane to a boat and Y&B on a similar boat, then Y&B would probably be a a tiny bit lighter than Mr. Vane.

On many boats there is equipment mounted on the transom that makes it difficult to mount a self steering system on the boats centre line.
It may be tempting to take the easy route and mount the system off centre so it clears the other equipment.

However, mounting the system off centre may result in the pendulum rudder surfacing on some courses resulting in sudden loss of power and poor steering. For the best results on all courses, always mount the system on the boats centre line.

For some situations on smaller boats using Mr. Vane with the optional off centre kit may offer a solution. This way the vane mast can be mounted off centre while keeping the pendulum rudder on the centre line.

As an alternative the vane base of both Y&B and WALT BYO can be made off centre. The vane base itself is moved a bit sideways making a little extra room to the side but the other components stay centred.

Generally not. Usually once the course is set there is no need to change the settings unless there is a change in the balance of the forces at work.
The most important change you will have to make changes for is a lasting change of windspeed.

You may be wondering if windvane self steering will work on your boat. What weight will work, or what length?
Well, neither weight nor length are used as a general guideline.

Servo pendulum self steering systems were designed to take over the steering from a human helmsman. That means that the forces and movement that need to be generated by the system are comparable.

That leads to a two-part answer.

If your boat has tiller steering, and the boat can be properly trimmed so that you do not have to fight the tiller to keep the boat on course, than a servo pendulum system like the ones on offer from Mister Vee should have no problem to do the same.

On a wheel steered boat there often is a reduction between the wheel and the rudder. If that reduction is too high it may be difficult or even impossible to set up self steering. However, if there is an option of connecting the self steering system to an emergency rudder, things get easier.
There is a separate FAQ about wheel steering.

If you have a (very) small boat you may wonder if it can be useful to set up a windvane self steering system.

Usually that will depend on two things:

• The kind of sailing you do
• How windvane self steering compares to the alternatives

If you never go sailing for more than two hours then for most it would be pointless. But if you always get too tired when you sail longer that 2 hours but you actually would like to go futher, then windvane self steering my be the ticket to Vreedom.

Small boats are often very lively which means that when you leave the tiller the boat immediately goes somewhere you do not want it to go. That often means that you can not feed yourself or get enough to drink. Also, sitting at the helm, in the same position, for hours on end makes you tired.

Self steering can change all that, which opens up possibilities to go where you could not go before.

But is windvane self steering the most practical? Most sailors turn to an autopilot first. And on short trips that is often a good choice.

But you do need enough power from the boats battery to be able to keep the auto pilot going. And that is often where smaller boats have a problem, especially on longer trips.

If the wind picks up, an autopilot consumes more power. And on a small boat that can amount to something like 70% of the daily power consumption! Draining the battery can break it.

With windvane self steering you do not worry about power consumption.

The light weight Mister Vee self steering systems offer the best alternative to an autopilot, especially on a smaller boat!

Windvane self steering can not cope with constant acceleration followed by slowing down.

When the boat accelerates to a significantly higher speed, the direction of the apparent wind changes. The windvane will steer the boat away from the wind, changing the total balance of boat and windvane.

The boat can then easily lose power from the sails and the system starts to steer back in to the wind.

This means that it may not be possible to steer an ultra light displacement boat or multi hull.

Especially on fast accelerating boats this will lead to unsatisfying steering. This is why we will not guarantee satisfaction when you install a windvane self steering system to a multi hull or a boat that has the ability to plane.

Use headless Vee and a simple tiller pilot for this purpose.

A lot of boats have equipment mounted on the transom close to where the self steering unit needs to be.

Experience has shown that it is easier to remove this equipment and then mount the windvane self steering and then remount the other equipment.

But if you have some equipment that is really difficult to move somewhere else, please send us an email so we can have a look at the options.

On many boats there is equipment mounted on the transom that makes it difficult to mount a self steering system on the boats centre line.
It may be tempting to take the easy route and mount the system off centre so it clears the other equipment.

However, mounting the system off centre may result in the pendulum rudder surfacing on some courses resulting in sudden loss of power and poor steering. For the best results on all courses, always mount the system on the boats centre line.

For some situations on smaller boats using Mr. Vane with the optional off centre kit may offer a solution. This way the vane mast can be mounted off centre while keeping the pendulum rudder on the centre line.

As an alternative the vane base of both Y&B and WALT BYO can be made off centre. The vane base itself is moved a bit sideways making a little extra room to the side but the other components stay centred.

No. Just as any other servo pendulum system the rudder is too small to be of any use if the boat becomes un-steerable through the boats main rudder.

On a wheel steered boat there often is a reduction between the wheel and the rudder.

If that reduction is done with hydraulics, Mister Vee do not offer self steering for your boat.
The hydraulics have too much internal friction for a standard servo pendulum system to overcome.

If your boat has a connection for an emergency tiller that can be used for windvane steering, that is by far the easiest option. The systems from Mister Vee require a tiller of about 35 cm (just over 1') and if it would make things easier, it can even point to the rear of the boat.

If there is no E-tiller, then a wheel adapter is required. This is connected to the centre of the steering wheel and the steering lines are connected to the adapter.

From the start the Mister Vee self steering systems were designed to be light weight. But how light is light?

There are brands that claim to offer "light weight" but do not mention the actual weight anywhere. Or their claim to light weight dates back to the 1980's.

Let there be no doubt. Mister Vee offer the lightest self steering systems ever!

The standard version of Mr. Vane weighs just over 7.5 kgs or 16 lbs.
The standard version of Y&B weighs just over 10 kgs or 22 lbs. This is also the lightest system ever. How?

To compare the two correctly they need to offer the same. As Mr. Vane is aimed at smaller boats than Y&B, comparing them side by side requires heavier parts on Mr. Vane.
This means that Mr. Vane should have the long pendulum rudder, the long pendulum rudder tube and the complete mounting kit.

If you then were to mount Mr. Vane to a boat and Y&B on a similar boat, then Y&B would probably be a a tiny bit lighter than Mr. Vane.

From the start in 2006 the Mister Vee self steering systems were shipped in parts to be self assembled.
This allowed packing the systems by an external company at a very low rate.

In 2012 government policies on these kinds of companies changed resulting in turmoil. This eventually lead to poorer quality and unhappy customers.

To get quality back up we took back parts handling. As it turned out it took relatively little extra time to actually assemble the systems in stead of just picking parts. As a bonus, parts get an extra check if they are up to standard.

Your system comes pre-assembled.
Final assembly normally takes about an hour in total.

Watching the glue dry will take a day but you can do other stuff during that time too.

The manuals for using your Vee (and servo pendulum systems in general) can be found here.

The manuals are available as PDF files. Access to these files is enabled when your system is shipped. You need to be logged in to access them. They can be reached from a menu on the right hand side of the website.

The gears are part of the system that transfers movement of the windvane to the vertical axis of pendulum rudder. The gears ONLY transfer movement, not force.

And yes, they are strong enough.

But hang on, Why do other brands use bronze or even stainless steel?

The Mister Vee pendulum rudder is almost perfectly balanced. The forces that are generated by the rudder act on the center of the pendulum rudder tube. This means that the gears indeed only transfer movement.

Some brands use less balanced pendulum rudders. These will require more force to be rotated and often have bigger windvane blades to generate this higher force. And this may require stronger gears as well.

Most plastics suffer from degradation due to the influence of ultra violet rays to some extent.

But the plastics used by Mister Vee are either in a position where actual strength is not much of an issue or a fibre reinforced version is used.
The fibres do not get damaged by UV so the only problem that may occur (after several years of use) is that the fibres become exposed at the surface of the tubes. This is why you should NEVER clean the tubes with any kind of abrasive.
The tubes are standard parts and can either be replaced cheaply or can even be painted to re-coat the fibres and lengthen the life span.

The only parts that is likely going to fail because of UV degradation at some point in time is the windvane blade. But using any other material would have involved serious design changes which would have resulted in a steep price increase. The complete wind vane can be taken off to be stored inside the boat when not in use to shelter from the sun.

Windvane self steering can not cope with constant acceleration followed by slowing down. Constant acceleration and slowing down results in a big fluctuation in apparent wind direction.
This results in a zig-zag course.

As a result satisfaction can not be guaranteed.

A boat with a centre cockpit requires longer steering lines and more guide blocks than a boat with a normal cockpit.
This can easier lead to more stretch and less responsive steering.

Combining that with wheel steering kan make things even more complicated.

On a wheel steered boat there often is a reduction between the wheel and the rudder.

If that reduction is done with hydraulics, Mister Vee do not offer self steering for your boat.
The hydraulics have too much internal friction for a standard servo pendulum system to overcome.

If your boat has a connection for an emergency tiller that can be used for windvane steering, that is by far the easiest option. The systems from Mister Vee require a tiller of about 35 cm (just over 1') and if it would make things easier, it can even point to the rear of the boat.

If there is no E-tiller, then a wheel adapter is required. This is connected to the centre of the steering wheel and the steering lines are connected to the adapter. Mister Vee do not offer such an adapter.

No.

The servo pendulum systems that are on offer from Mister Vee can not overcome the internal friction of a hydraulic transmission of steering input.

Only auxiliary rudder type systems, which Mister Vee do not offer, will do in this situation.

All orders are placed through the webshop. It is a step by step process and you will not find yourself stuck with an order for a system you do not actually want.

More information about using the webshop can be found here

All prices are listed in the webshop

The Mister Vee website can be reached trough several URL's such as www.mistervee.com and www.windvaneselfsteering.com and all of these URL's can be used both with and without the leading www.

If you have logged in using www.mistervee.com but use another URL the next time, fi. by following a link, you will not be logged in and may not reach the page you want.

The easiest way to avoid this is logging in to the website and then make a bookmark to be used the next time.

If you want to visit a link that has (for instance) windvaneselfsteering.com in it but you are logged in at www.mistervee.com, copy whatever is behind windvaneselfsteering.com (/?q=etcetera) and paste that behind www.mistervee.com

You should then reach the page you want.

NOTE:
It is not necessary to log out after each visit.

It can also be that your account has been deleted. This is done when the email address associated with your account can no longer be reached. We check this once a year.

The manuals for using your Vee (and servo pendulum systems in general) can be found here.

The manuals are available as PDF files. Access to these files is enabled when your system is shipped. You need to be logged in to access them. They can be reached from a menu on the right hand side of the website.

If you use Google translate to browse the Mister Vee website, ordering from the webshop will not work.

Please open a second window in your browser and order from the untranslated English website.

There are a few websites that offer new spare parts for Navik. But as far as we can tell, Mister Vee is the only company that can actually deliver.

All Navik replacement parts sold by Mister are new designs made from the same or better quality materials.

Only the parts that are mentioned in the webshop are on offer as a standard product.

Have a look at the Navik parts in the webshop

If you need another part we still may be able to help, please let us know.

All orders are placed through the webshop. It is a step by step process and you will not find yourself stuck with an order for a system you do not actually want.

More information about using the webshop can be found here

Mister Vee self steering systems are made in batches, in the most efficient sequence. These batches are shipped in April, July and October.
Shipments are in order of payment. When the system is shipped it usually takes no more than a week to arrive.

If parts are in stock or can be easily be made or ordered, you can also order for delivery in other months.
Including shipping your system will normally be at your door in about 2-3 weeks after payment has been received.

Currently we offer the following payment options:

• iDEAL
• Visa & MasterCard
• Maestro
• Mister Cash
• Giropay
• DIRECTebanking

These payments are handled by Multisafepay, www.multisafepay.com

You will receive a payment request by email when your payment is due. This email includes a link that takes you to the Multisafepay website.
There you can pay in euro (€) and if needed this amount will be converted to your own currency.

As part of the order process you will receive two invoices:

• A pro forma invoice
• A complete invoice

The complete invoice is a commercial document that lists the products and other items like shipping that you need to pay or in the case of purchasing from Mister Vee, have paid for. The complete invoice complies with the rules the Netherlands revenue service has stated.

The proforma invoice has the same contents as the complete invoice but does not have an invoice date.

The pro forma invoice is issued so that you have an overview of your planned purchase and the details you need to make the payment.
When your purchase is shipped, the complete invoice is included with the shipment or sent separately. The complete invoice mentions the invoice date, which marks the start of your warranty.

Complete self steering systems are shipped via UPS and generally take 4 days to reach you.

Navik parts are shipped by post which is the cheapest option. If you need you part urgently you may consider paying extra for extra secure and speedy delivery.

If you use Google translate to browse the Mister Vee website, ordering from the webshop will not work.

Please open a second window in your browser and order from the untranslated English website.