When do you show a cone when motor sailing?
Whenever you're sailing with the engine driving the boat, by day: one black cone, point down, forward (Rule 25(e)).
With the engine in gear you are a power-driven vessel under the Rules, sails or not. The cone tells others you've lost the sailing vessel's place in the pecking order and follow the power-driven rules.
- At night show power-driven lights: masthead light, sidelights and sternlight. Not the tricolour.
- The International Rules have no size exemption for the cone. The US Inland Rules exempt boats under 12 m, which is where the confusion comes from.
Source: COLREGS Rule 25(e), Rule 3 and Rule 23.
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