Palmnautix Helm · for twin electric outboards
Palmnautix Helm puts both of your electric outboards on one joystick. Turn on the spot, creep into a berth, and press HOLD to stay where you are, with no anchor. Pull the cord and everything stops, in hardware.Both outboards on one joystick. HOLD keeps you on the spot, no anchor. The cord stops everything.
Why we built it
Turning, docking and backing up mean juggling two motors at once. One joystick does it for you: push where you want to go, twist to turn.
Rocky bottoms, seagrass, deep water and marinas all say no. HOLD keeps you on a GPS spot instead, a virtual anchor with nothing on the seabed.
Fishing a spot, waiting for a bridge or picking up a swimmer, you're correcting all the time. The helm corrects ten times a second so you don't.
Two ways to get it
Works today with Rhino BLX 80 V2. More outboards to follow.
Join the waitlist · HelmFor RIBs and small boats from about 4 to 6 m, with or without motors today.
Join the waitlist · CompleteFour modes · one button each
Every auto mode engages with a one-second press, so a bump never sets the boat off. Full joystick at any time takes you straight back to MANUAL.
Stays on its GPS spot. The bow turns into the drift and the motors push back.
Keeps the bow on a compass heading while you set the speed with the joystick.
Lets the current carry you while the bow stays at the angle you chose. Made for drift fishing.
Tracks a straight line over the ground, crabbing against the current so you arrive where you aimed.
How it works
GPS and a heading sensor report position and bow direction ten times a second over the boat's NMEA 2000 network.
The helm works out the drift and turns the bow into it, because two fixed stern motors push forward and back, never sideways.
One motor runs harder than the other to turn, both push to hold. Each motor controller idles on its own if commands ever stop.
The helm
One panel, built for wet hands and bright sun: big illuminated buttons, a joystick that drives both motors, and a sunlight-readable screen that tells you exactly what the boat is doing.
Clip it to your life jacket. Pull it and both motors drop to idle in hardware, within 50 ms.
3.5-inch display with day, dusk and red night palettes. Shows the spot, the drift and each motor's push.
MANUAL is amber and shaped differently, so you find it without looking. Auto modes need a one-second press.
MENU opens the settings: profile, thrust limit, geofence, brightness and palette. POWER switches the helm on; hold it two seconds to switch off.
Push to drive, twist to turn. In HOLD a tap moves your spot by one metre. Press it down to select in the menu or silence an alarm.
Safety, built in hardware
The most important stops don't rely on software. They're wired in, and the software has to agree with them.
A dual-channel stop loop runs from the clip to both motors. Pull it, or cut a wire, and the motors go to idle whatever the software is doing.
If a motor stops hearing the helm, it idles by itself. If its own controller stalls, a hardware watchdog idles it.
Push the joystick all the way for a third of a second in any auto mode and you're back in MANUAL, with a chirp to confirm.
Specifications
First production run. Figures marked as targets are being validated on the water.
Live demo
The demo runs the actual helm and motor software in your browser, the same code that goes on the boat. Drive it, press HOLD, pull the kill-cord.
Open the live helmFirst production run
Join the waitlist for early access, launch pricing and an invite to the sea trials. Tell us which package you're after.