2019-04-16, 08:19 PM
1. Probably. Sean or someone else familiar with PyPilot could tell you for sure. You'll need a motor driver of sufficient current capacity, but that's true for any autopilot. Sean sells them on his website at pypilot.org
2. You definitely need rudder feedback. Again, Sean is the expert. on what works best.
3. There are lots of linear actuators out there. The trick is to find one with sufficient power, stroke and speed. Oh, and waterproof/marineized is pretty important. I have a Raymarine autopilot with an actuator on my Ben Oceanis 390. The actuator is HUGE. Think about going downwind in a following sea and how much your boat wants to round up. That energy you would would normally be putting on the wheel with muscle has to be provided by the autopilot system. So, do-able, but probably not cheap for the actuator.
4. Dunno if the 9255 would be enough. Should be, properly calibrated.
5. The ST4000 control head uses SeaTalk to output to the rest of the SeaTalk network, and the autopilot. The ST4000 control head has an NMEA input (for things like wind, bearing to waypoint, cross track error, etc.) but there isn't anything else you could use for input I suppose if you loved your control head, you could create a box that takes in SeaTalk and outputs to PyPilot. You could also just use a simple wireless keychain remote control, like you might use for a garage door opener. They are cheap and easy to set up.
2. You definitely need rudder feedback. Again, Sean is the expert. on what works best.
3. There are lots of linear actuators out there. The trick is to find one with sufficient power, stroke and speed. Oh, and waterproof/marineized is pretty important. I have a Raymarine autopilot with an actuator on my Ben Oceanis 390. The actuator is HUGE. Think about going downwind in a following sea and how much your boat wants to round up. That energy you would would normally be putting on the wheel with muscle has to be provided by the autopilot system. So, do-able, but probably not cheap for the actuator.
4. Dunno if the 9255 would be enough. Should be, properly calibrated.
5. The ST4000 control head uses SeaTalk to output to the rest of the SeaTalk network, and the autopilot. The ST4000 control head has an NMEA input (for things like wind, bearing to waypoint, cross track error, etc.) but there isn't anything else you could use for input I suppose if you loved your control head, you could create a box that takes in SeaTalk and outputs to PyPilot. You could also just use a simple wireless keychain remote control, like you might use for a garage door opener. They are cheap and easy to set up.