Garmin SmartMode, and here comes Simrad Bridge

Ben Ellison

Ben Ellison

Panbo editor, publisher & chief bottlewasher from 4/2005 until 8/2018, and now pleased to have Ben Stein as a very able publisher, webmaster, and editing colleague. Please don't regard him as an "expert"; he's getting quite old and thinks that "fadiddling fumble-putz" is a more accurate description.

10 Responses

  1. Ben Ellison Ben Ellison says:

    Once I noticed the little multi-screen icon that now appears at the bottom of the NSS evo2 home screen, Bridge Control works great. The network sees all the screens already created for each MFD in the Bridge group and let’s you save them as Bridge presets. Nice!

  2. Capt Bill says:

    Ben,
    that wind page looks like it is from the 741. Where is it on the 8xxx series? I searched in vain and the best I can get to show wind is a “wind Rose” overlaid around the boat on a chart. We are using an Airmar WX150 weather station (N2K).

  3. Ben Ellison Ben Ellison says:

    Bill, look in Functions/Gauges/Wind. Full screen on the 8212 it’s even sexier than the 741 screen, w two wind history graphs and more data windows. Great by default but much customization possible under Menu key. My water speed and wind is coming from Maretron sensors, heading from Raymarine, so think it will work fine w Airmar N2K.
    If you don’t see the feature, check your 8xxx software for possible update.

  4. Xavier Itzmann says:

    Hello Ben,
    Does Simrad Bridge control the Tritons/IS40’s/Triton HV displays also?
    Or only the MFD’s? We find ourselves changing many of our displays depending on whether we are on an oceanic multi-day non-stop leg, or motoring, or sail-motoring, or in a river, or what have you.
    The ability to do “bridge” across a couple of Zeuses and several Tritons would be awesome; if the functionality is merely confined to just Zeus/NSO/NSS, the value of the proposition is probably not sufficient for us to upgrade to evo2; we would have to wait for the next hw/sw upgrade cycle.

  5. Ben Ellison Ben Ellison says:

    Xavier, Simrad Bridge works quite nicely with the NSS16 and 7 evo2’s but did not show the Triton installed in the test system as a display it could coordinate.

  6. Xavier Itzmann says:

    Thanks Ben. There are probably computing power limits to how much can the Tritons do.
    Nonetheless, you’ll have to agree that:
    1) Tritons/IS40s are made for dynamic changing; otherwise, we should just go back to analog gauges that cannot be changed!
    2) Just like Simrad Bridge will change the displays on MFDs to suit function, it logically should be able to change the Tritons/IS40 as well.
    Cheerio,

  7. Steve@Simrad says:

    Currently Bridge Control functionality is only supported on the Simrad evo2 platform. We don’t integrate B&G Triton or Simrad IS40 displays today – but it is a direction we are pursuing. Bridge Control relies on Ethernet connectivity and extending to N2K instruments requires additional development. The B&G team is also pursuing similar concepts to Bridge Control for HV displays (via Zeus2 and H5000 systems – which can change data displays based on the wind angle) and by extension the Triton displays. Larger boats may have upwards of 10 Triton or H5000 displays, so ensuring that the configuration is easy and intuitive presents some special challenges, but we have ideas on how to do this. Stay tuned.

  8. Steve says:

    Steve@Simrad, glad to hear the bridge control for the Tritons is on the roadmap. Will definitely be useful for my Zeus2 and 3 Tritons on my sailboat.

  9. Xavier Itzmann says:

    Steve@Simrad,
    Thanks for the follow-up and here’s looking forward to the fruits of your labor!
    You raise the point of controlling HV’s from Zeus2 —but let’s not forget that the “Triton HV” product is controlled… from the Tritons.
    Hopefully the “Triton HV” series will be evolved in sync with the “HV” series.
    Cheerio,

  10. tcy says:

    Hi Ben.
    Didn.t you notice Garmins new 74 serie on there website also has smartmode. And what about the new pilot can.t whait the see it working the ghp12 is great pilot do think with this new pilot it only gets better.

Join the conversation

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *