We all know that there are various products on the market that claim to be able to cure seasickness. We are never certain as to whether they work or not, some involve taking a drug which can make you drowsy, one involves wearing a wrist band which puts pressure on an acupuncture point, another involves wearing an electrical gadget like a watch on your wrist, one of the best that I know involves sticking patches behind your ears which slowly release a drug into the exact area where seasickness is caused.  All of these 'cures' involve either ingesting a drug or fixing something to your body.

At last someone has come up with a revolutionary idea for motor cruisers, that will both increase comfort at sea and help enormously to prevent seasickness. This is a gyro stabiliser that is small enough to fit on a boat of about 10 meters but powerful enough to work on much larger boats up to 50 meters in length, it is called the 'Seakeeper 7000 Gyro' AND it really works!  The company is called Seakeeper Inc, their factory is in the US and their web site is:  www.seakeeper.com  Independent tests which include both technical information and videos have been carried out and can be seen at:  www.boattest.com

Gyro stabilisers have been around for a long time but hitherto have only been fitted to large ships, this was because of the amount of space that they need and the amount of power required to run them. The Seakeeper 7000 weighs only 455 kgs and is just 797 mm long, 982 mm wide and  671 mm high. It should if possible be fitted in the engine space and in a high speed boat it should not be fitted in a forward part of the boat, it does not have to be fitted on the centerline.

The reason for the efficiency, low power consumption and small size of this stabiliser is because the gyro operates in a vacuum.  It runs on 185-230 Volts AC, 50/60 Hz, single phase power of up to 20 Amps so will require a generator to be running at sea or the boat connected to shore power in a marina.

The gyro runs at 10000 rpm and takes 45 minutes to reach full speed, but actually operates effectively after only 25 minutes from when it has been switched on.  Tests show that it reduces both roll and yaw by a minimum of 50% which for your passengers can be the difference between a day of misery feeling awful with seasickness or a lovely day out on the water. It also works very well at anchor; we have all experienced lunch on board at anchor and not having enough hands to grab all the plates as they slide off the table caused by the  enormous wake from another boat as it goes past far too fast. With the Seakeeper 7000 running this need never happen again.

This stabiliser is so new on the market that I don't think we yet have an agent in Portugal, unsurprisingly the manufacturers don't put the price on their web site, I am sure it is not going to be cheap! However they do have an on-line form on their web site for you to enter the specifications of your boat and they will get back to you with a price. Unfortunately Seakeeper Inc have done a multi million dollar deal with the Azimut Benetti group in which they have agreed not to supply that company's direct competitors with the Seakeeper 7000 system for several years. It may therefore not be possible when you buy a new boat to have one fitted by the factory, unless of course you have a unit delivered to you and you have it transported to the shipyard where your new boat is being built, in which case I am sure the boat builders will be happy to fit it for you.