Panbo

Navico Broadband Radar, truly safer?

Since we're already discussing the Navico BR24, let's take a look at an interesting disagreement that's cropped up regarding its safety claims.  At introduction, Navico's CEO called this low wattage solid state technology "a huggable radar" -- i.e. without any radiation danger whatsoever.  But how dangerous are conventional magnetron marine radars in this size range?  In the July issue of PMY, the new electronics editor Tim Bartlett tries to answer that question, and concludes, "So rest easy. While your microwave oven could theoretically cook you, a small radar can't because it doesn't transmit long enough or with enough power."  Navico disagrees... 

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BR vs UHD, Capt. Kessler is surprised

The weather here -- a phenomenal run of rain and fog -- has been great for testing the Broadband Radar temporarily installed on Li'l Gizmo, and I promise a screenshot show soon.  But I've realized that while I've used many radars, and seen many others demonstrated, I've never had one on my own boat, and thus am not dead sure that the performance I'm seeing is as amazing as it seems.  How convenient, then, that the indomitable Spirit of Zapolite cruised in out of the murk on Monday, complete with a brand new Furuno NavNet 3D system swinging a 4' Ultra High Definition array.  That's the indomitable Capt. Kessler above, trying to tune NN3D/UHD to get as crisp and detailed an image of Camden Inner Harbor as he'd just seen on a 14-foot outboard!

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Wireless N2K wind & more, Tacktick style

Mission accomplished!  I tried integrating a Tacktick wireless sensor and display network with a NMEA 2000 sensor and display network, and the results were quite good.  The depth seen on the remote above is coming from a Maretron DST100 in Gizmo's bottom.  The Micronet system is also getting Heading, Speed through Water, COG/SOG, and more from the N2K system, which it can display and/or use for True Wind calculations.  Meanwhile -- and perhaps coolest of all -- all displays on the N2K backbone are getting Apparent Wind info from the wireless Tacktick wind vane I simply clamped to Gizmo's mast...

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Radar teases: Garmin goes big, Panbo gets wet

Thanks to Rich Owings, who runs the excellent GPSTracklog site, we now know that Garmin will soon introduce four new open array radars.  The photo above comes from deep within the FCC equipment authorization database (sorry, linkage not possible), where anyone as patient as Rich might have discovered that four new Garmin radars were granted approval on Friday.  The model designations are GMR 604, 606, 1204, and 1206 -- which strongly suggest that they range from a 6 kW 4 foot array to a 12 kW 6 foot unit (hello, big yachts and sport fishermen) -- and which will probably be sold in two parts like Garmin's existing open arrays.   But what the heck is "xHD"...?...

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Broadband Radar now shipping, installs neatly

Navico Broadband Radar is apparently meeting its promised "Q2" shipping schedule, and I'm already impressed with the install details.  Above you can see how a waterproof gland fits over the scanner cable -- which is just a bundle of Ethernet and power wires -- before it's screwed to the interface box.  If the ultimate destination is a Simrad NX or a Northstar 8000i, you then run a proprietary serial cable to the 'comms' port, while Lowrance HDS units use a proprietary Ethernet cable to that orangey 'network' port.  It all went together quickly and feels solid...

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Panbo punts, Garmin grieves

This entry's title is not about cause and effect; my wind sensor testing may go incomplete, but that has nothing to do with Garmin's chart problem.  And while I had a good time on the water yesterday, even if frustrated by details, the mood in Kansas seemed a bit morose.  Imagine the satisfaction of introducing all the free and amazing enhancements in Garmin's 5.0 marine software (which I was enjoying immensely, as seen above), but then just a few weeks later realizing that there was a processing error in the creation of new and improved Bluecharts that was potentially so bad that you had to recall all the 2009 chart cards sold so far around the world. Ouch!

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N2K wind #1, Gizmo testing begins (update)

Yes, this rig is raising some eyebrows around Camden Harbor, but I think it will teach me more about NMEA 2000 wind sensors than I've been able to figure out in the lab.  I've got all five cabled to the test instrument panel as well as a MFD or two and Gizmo's laptop.  And you can see that I can at least theoretically simulate sailboat mast heel and motion thanks to the Ram Mount.  I'm not expecting to get wind-tunnel-accurate results here, but it should be interesting.  Don't hesitate with suggestions on how to use this rig and what to look for; I should be online much of the day, and may even update this entry from the boat. Good times...

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GPS problems? Boaters last!

I think that the Google news search above, and those 397 articles you can click through to, mostly indicate that the US General Accounting Office accomplished its goal: Light a fire under the collective butt of the U.S. Air Force, which has apparently been slow at deploying two billion dollars to upgrade the GPS satellite system (GAO report here).  I've gotten several notes of concern about the situation, but I think boaters are about the last user group that needs to worry about it.  We almost invariably use GPS in almost ideal conditions, puttering along at a relatively slow speed with a wide open sky view. And we don't care beans about altitude (except for going negative)!  We were about the first to get into GPS because it was useful on the water before the full constellation of satellites was in place, and, if the system truly does break down, we may be the last.  But we surely do value electronic positioning a great deal.  So here's my question:  If we're having trouble keeping GPS fit on a two billion dollar budget, why the heck is the government even considering saving a tenth of that by shutting down eLoran, a viable backup system?

Ode to Garmin updating, especially MarineNet 5.0

Lucky me, I have an amazingly bright and progressive plumber who is also a seriously addicted boater, and sometimes we barter our respective skills.  Which is how I found myself tuning up and updating his old GPSMap 276C last week.  I was amazed to discover that Garmin's latest update for it was just released on March 19; it's a minor update, to be sure, but this unit has been around since 2004 (when I gave it a prize).  And so I planned an entry complimenting Garmin on its perfectionistic persistence...but that was before I saw the just-released 5.0 software for the networkable 4- and 5000 series.   Wow...

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Lowrance HDS-10 hands-on #1, hello NOS

I plan to thoroughly check out the sample Lowrance HDS-10 I recently received, and will probably write about it a lot too.  It marks not only a major MFD refresh for Lowrance, but also, I'm told, the first MFD series based on NOS, the Navico Operating System.  In other words, the underlying software was created not only by Lowrance developers but others in Navico's now global R&D department, and some form of it will likely show up in future products from Navico's other brands, like Simrad and Northstar.  I'm going to save the sexy stuff for next week, when I try the unit on the water; today I'm going to mostly discuss some geeky but important data networking aspects of the machine...

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Thermal imaging, coming to your boat eventually?

This graph is a thermal sensor manufacturer's dream -- and was, in fact, created by the marketing department at FLIR -- but, hey, that's us way over to the right.  I'd love to see the price of thermal cameras go so low, and unit volume so high, that "most cars/boats/ships" have them.  Like GPS, once you understand how well the technology works, you want to have it aboard.  I remember well the Magellan Nav 1000 (below), which seemed totally magic 20 years ago, but was actually quite crude and cost over $1,000...

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Garmin GPSMap 640, hands-on #1

One gizmo that's definitely coming along on the Gizmo delivery is this Garmin 640 beta unit.  In nüvi mode it can navigate the highways down to Connecticut, as it's done well twice already, and I can then reboot it into marine mode for the voyage home, with XM audio and weather available all the while.  The marine satellite weather presentation seems particularly good, as you can see somewhat if you click on the screen above; it's set up so that the Nexrad radar and cloud cover are animated and a finger tap leads to a choice of local forecasts, buoy data, and more, depending where you tap.  But finding a good place for this 18 ounce "portable" on your dash or at your helm may not be easy...

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Conning displays, another use for NMEA 2000

It wasn't just pirate drama (hurray for the good guys!) that had me thinking about big ship helms recently.  When I was reading IEC documents about AIS target plotting last week, I came across the nifty "conning display" above.  Even in greyscale it suggests how useful it is to integrate lots of usually discrete vessel data onto one screen.  While I've seen conning displays in the past, and thought that something similar could be useful on even medium size yachts, that thought is particularly intriquing because nowadays every bit of data on this screen could be delivered over a single NMEA 2000 backbone.

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CE 2009 hands-on #1; wows, confusions, and a gripe!

I spent some of this weekend installing and trying out Coastal Explorer 2009, and was thoroughly impressed.  CE, also sold as Maptech Chart Navigator Pro, has always been an excellent charting program, in my opinion, and the 2009 edition is a worthy successor.  The screen shot above, for instance, shows the slick new automated NOAA raster and vector chart updating routine (and the fact I was doing the updating while riding a train, via a Sprint EVDO WiFi server, suggests how possible online onboard is getting).  CE 2009 also easily incorporated lots of Maptech data -- photo maps, topos, harbor photos, and marina databases -- that was already on my PCs.  But CE's included Guide Book data, access to TerraServer photo maps and its new abilities to display Panoramio photos and CE user community POI info (photos included) make Maptech data somewhat less important.  Which may be a good thing, in a way, as the relationship between CE's creator, Rosepoint Navigation, and the company that took over Maptech's digital chart business, Maptech Navigation, has gotten a little confusing...

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Garmin GWS 10, hands on #2

I'm pleased to report that wind speed and direction data from Garmin's GWS 10 NMEA 2000 wind wand shows up fine on all the N2K instrument displays and MFDs in the lab.  (There is a small problem with the GWS's air temp and pressure data, which Garmin will probably fix quickly.)  The only oddity is a substantial response lag on the Raymarine ST70 (but I understand that a major software update of that unit is coming soon). Using the GMI 10 or a Garmin MFD like the 5212 you can correct the vane's offset (if the masthead install wasn't perfect) or dial in speed and direction dampening factors if you don't like the "auto" modes (I do, so far). Aside from the ST70, all displays responded instantly to such calibrations.
    While it's nice that sensor/display mixing is possible, Garmin deserves applause for the wind screens it created for the GMI 10. The Garmin coders might consider "borrowing" that rectangular gauge design from Raymarine -- which makes maximum use of the screen -- but Raymarine, and Maretron, ought to "borrow" a lot from Garmin...

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Furuno SC30, NMEA 2000 every which way

Furuno USA has finally released the SC30 Satellite Compass, after putting it "through strenuous testing" and "modifying the software to meet our testing requirements."  Heck, I thought it performed phenomenally well last June.  The SC30 is NMEA 2000 device, and an interesting aspect of its launch is Furuno's excellent PDF diagrams illustrating all the ways it can be installed.  Today I recommended the Installation Guide in the back of the Maretron catalog as a good reference on N2K wiring, but it does tend to portray 2000 backbones in a more linear way than they really have to be. In the diagram above, for instance, the Furuno FI-50002 junction box is serving as the the entire backbone, power feed and terminators included, and all the other devices are being dropped off (to the 6 meter max). The diagrams also reveal a Furuno translator box developement they haven't talked about yet...

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Raymarine ST70 Plus, super all-in-one?

We had a peek at the ST70 Plus a while back, but I got to see them on the water in Miami, and, besides, there's a hot conversation going on about ideal instrument displays over on the forums (warning: gobs 'o' geek talk). My photo --- taken in glaring Florida sunshine, with on-screen crap you normally don't notice included --- doesn't do justice to the display's brightness, VGA resolution, and deep color saturation, but it might actually be more realistic than the glamor shots now available at Raymarine.com. The latter do, however, show many of the Plus's display choices and color palettes. Or "Colours" as they spell it in the King's English, and as mentioned in my shot above. Which does illustrate a bit of the system architecture I was originally confused about (and which is also explained in the now posted manuals). It seems like a flexible and powerful architecture (and hence inherently confusing), and probably a winner...

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Airmar H2183 compass, best in class?

Airmar's new H2183 heading sensor is motion compensated every which way; i.e. it's a 3-axis solid-state compass integrated with a 3-axis accelerometer and a 3-axis rate gyro. That's news both in terms of real world compass precision and the masthead performance of Airmar's PB200 Weather Station, whose gyro only senses yaw. In fact, while Airmar is pleased with the how well the PB200 seems to work on Dan Corcoran's sailboat, it may not promote the Weather Station to sailors until it can produce a model that incorporates the 3-axis gyro. But the H2183 is shipping now, for about $700 retail, and Airmar claims that its accuracy in "dynamic conditions" --- i.e. on a boat in a seaway --- is "best in class." And it's backing up the claim with the side-by-side testing video snapped above. While the "competitor" compass is not clearly identified, it's almost undoubtedly Maretron's well regarded SC200. The performance gauntlet is slapped down! And if Maretron or Simrad or whoever has a rebuttal, Panbo is ready to run it.

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Raymarine A-Series, hands on #1

Try as I might, my photograph (click it for bigger) still fails to truly illustrate how sharp and color rich this sample of Raymarine's new A-Series actually is. I haven't yet subjected it to bright sunlight, which may mute the goodness considerably (hey, we've got two feet of snow on the ground here, people, and the snow banks chest high!). But I did bench test it for a couple of hours yesterday, which included feeding it large quantities of NMEA 2000 data (via an STng-to-standard-N2K patch cable). The A57d did well. The well developed C- and E-Series feature/interface set seems to be all here --- V4 update included (and radar excluded) --- if in miniature. Notice, for instance, the COG, Heading, Tide, and Wind arrows around the boat icon. I wouldn't normally use them all at once, but I've always found these graphics useful, given accurate sensors (and wondered why other manufacturers didn't steal them)...

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Raymarine C Widescreens, impressions

I got aboard a demo of the new Raymarine C-Series Widescreens last week and was fairly impressed. While I don't really care that these 16 x 9 aspect ratio screens are "theater like", I do believe in getting the biggest display possible, and this format helps, because the fit-onto-helm constraint is usually vertical. (You can see demo boat helm here.) The format also seems to work well with some styles of split screen navigation, as I attempted to illustrate above. If I'd had more time I'd have put both chart and radar in look-ahead modes, and set the soft key menu to auto hide. Note that the screen, at 1280 x 800 pixels, looks sharper than my photo shows, but is purportedly still about as bright as the existing C-Series. Raymarine has tons on the new MFDs here, and I have some niggles below...

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Navico Broadband Radar, beta demo

It's a lousy photo (even clicked larger), but amazing once you understand it. Notice the piling somewhat hidden behind Navico Broadband Radar engineer Don Korte and right off the bow of yesterday's demo boat. Then check out the screen of the Lowrance HDS 10 slightly obscured by my new colleague Chris Woodward (who writes for Sport Fishing). It's delivering a clean target plot of the piling less than 30' from the 18" scanner dome! I saw this sort of extraordinary near-range performance all over Biscayne Bay yesterday. The little scanner easily resolved a quarter mile string of channel pilings like this one, and all the boats using the channel, and it separated a 40' sailboat close to a low shore over a half mile away. And that was all in complete auto mode; with a little tweaking we could sometimes see crab pot buoys like the one lower left in the photo, or gulls sitting on calm water.

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Sailing with an Airmar PB200

PB200 with VHF extension pole for mounting atop a masthead

I am writing to share my excitement about a new product from Airmar, tested aboard my 39 foot sailboat this past October-November. The Airmar PB200 is a compact masthead sensor that includes an ultrasonic (no moving parts) wind sensor, solid state compass, GPS receiver and more, along with a 3-axis accelerometer. It has an NMEA-0183 output that I found compatible with my Raymarine instrument suite. Airmar doesn't market this for use on a sailboat, but when I learned about the new version of this powerboat product, I got excited about the potential to make my autopilot much more useful when sailing short-handed. Thanks in part to Panbo, I got the opportunity to evaluate a beta version on my own sailboat...

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Tacktick mn30/T033, economy wireless

I've had impressive results with the Tacktick Micronet system on the Annie G., but the gear is expensive. Good then that Tacktick has introduced an economy version of the T101 wind system, called the mn30 and/or T033 (click on photo above for larger version). The nifty solar-powered, wireless masthead sensor is the same, but the display is powered from a boat's 12v supply instead of solar cells. Which seems like a reasonable trade for a discount of over $400 retail, and might even be preferable on boats where the display doesn't get sufficient sunlight. Actually, there may be some other features missing from the mn30/T033 that I haven't found yet. But I do know that it supports basic calibration like offset and speed %, and can integrate with a Micronet wireless speedo or NMEA box (& GPS) for True Wind readings. Here's the manual PDF and U.S. distributor Ocean Equipment's listing.

Si-Tex T900, new standalone radar

Some boaters don’t like multifunction displays—the theory being that several dedicated devices will never leave a skipper functionless—and thus I’m sometimes asked to recommend a standalone radar. Which is tough, as the recreational models from Furuno, JRC, and Raymarine that I used to be familiar with all seem to be history. Well, check out Si-Tex’s new T-900…

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Raymarine ST70+, good idea!

Photographing a brochure leads to distortions (thanks regardless to Richard “Widescreen” Brain), but use your imagination to square up and sharpen the new Raymarine ST70+ image above. Then understand that this 6.5” 640 x 400 pixel screen is capable of showing all the SeaTalkNG/NMEA 2000 navigation, engine, and systems data promised in the original ST70, and I think you’ll agree that this is a welcome product indeed. But where are the control buttons?

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Raymarine C Series Widescreen, really new

All hail Richard Brain. While the Consumer Electronics Show, year-end “best new…” lists and patent searches may all offer 2009 marine electronics possibilities, the real deal—mainly a passel of very interesting Raymarine preview products—is being shown at the London Boat Show. And Richard was kind enough to collect brochures, photograph them, and email them to me for your Panbo pleasure. So let’s thank Richard and say hello to Ray’s new “Widescreen” C Series, which is truly different from the original…

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Broadband Radar, more details

Last week I wrote my March PMY column about Navico’s Broadband Radar and learned some more details in the process. The pricing, for instance, is almost finalized, and sounds decent. The Lowrance version of the BR dome will have a $1,599 MAP (Minimum Advertised Price) while the Northstar and Simrad models—with a few extra features, like MARPA—will cost a few hundred more dollars. However, the unusual solid-state interior hardware seen above, and bigger here, will be same across brands, as will the basic performance, which is sounding quite interesting…

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Garmin AP, P47 worthy; how about you?

My December PMY column on Garmin’s GHP 10/GHC 10 autopilot system is now online, and I want to add a couple of illustrations and links. One is the GHC’s go-to-waypoint screen, above and bigger here. When I suggested it might be “slightly too fancy”, I meant in comparison to other fancy yet easy-to-understand graphics seen on the little GHC/GMI screen, like the column’s opening photo, bigger here. In fact this was beta software, and I didn’t get to try the waypoint function on the water; the screen may seem less busy in use, or it may have been changed. I do see an unfamiliar autopilot screen on Garmin’s fancy new marine networking site.

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METS, field reports

I’m pleased to pass along METS notes from Andy Murray, Service Manager at Globe Marine, and Kees Verruijt, a software developer/entrepreneur and marine electronics enthusiast. A big thanks to both for some interesting impressions and news nuggets. Of course all biases expressed, or mistakes made, are their own! First up, Andy:

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Honeywell PC SS radar, wow again!

Wow, Panbo works! While it’s pure coincidence that two really interesting—though quite different—solid state marine radars were announced yesterday, I got an early head’s up on both and, better yet, Panbot “DavidV”—who turns out to be a principal developer of the Honeywell prototype ss radar seen above—has already helped us understand how it compares to Navico Broadband (see comments). Unfortunately Honeywell’s “Programmable, Pulse Compression, X-Band Radar,” which David just presented at the eNavigation Conference, is not yet even scheduled for production, but, wow, I think you’ll agree that’s likely, if they can get the costs reasonable. The collage above, and bigger here, compares a Furuno 2117 commercial radar working at its .75 nm range (though showing more) with the 40 watt solid state set at 5 nm range, but zoomed in. The boat moved a bit between screen shots but the difference in range resolution seems obvious and amazing.

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Navico Broadband Radar, a really big deal?

One reason I wish I were at METS today is that Navico not only debuted its Broadband Radar, but may be running it in their booth. That’s possible because this 18” solid state radar transmits at “1/2000th the power of typical pulse radars.” And it might even generate meaningful images inside that huge show hall as the technology is supposed to be amazingly good at resolving short-range targets (as suggested above). The various Lowrance, Northstar, and Simrad MFDs that are going to be updated to support this scanner will even have a 1/32 nm range. So…high target resolution, very low power draw, almost no dangerous radiation, and no tuning or warm up time needed…is this an interesting development, or what?

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Raymarine at FLIBS, A & STX & SHD

In Fort Lauderdale, Raymarine once again did a great job with sea trials, offering rides aboard a center console equipped with a new A70D chartplotter/fishfinder and SmartPilot X-5 Sport, and the same big G-packing fly bridge yacht they used last year, only now with STX and Super HD radar. While there’s certainly been a lag between the STX pilot introduction and actual shipping products, the series does look good. The new ST70 control head (above) is sexy and gives access to new features like fishing patterns, but some users will appreciate the ability to use older Ray control heads as well, or instead of. In fact, the STX family seems remarkably flexible in terms of boat type and system integration.

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Simrad at FLIBS, GB65 & MX510

This old-man-on-a-megayacht shot seems right for my birthday (62!), and also says a lot about what Simrad is up to. The 142’ Richmond Lady sports a passel of Simrad gear, including two GB60 systems with six 19” displays. There’s a lot of detail on this Richmond Yacht page, and you can check out the bigger photo (thanks to Ron Ballanti). Though it’s not online yet, the GB60 will soon be upgraded to the GB65, which will include MAX Pro cartography and support for GRIB files and Navico's Sirius Weather Module (which will pop up in several Navico brands).

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Garmin at FLIBS, 640 & GWS 10

Garmin had a working GPSMap 640 at FLIBS, and I found a couple of nice surprises on it. One is that it does AIS plotting, which wasn’t even mentioned on the press release. More important really is the improved touch screen interface. Notice the status labels on the big buttons above; in cases where the only choice is on/off, like Tide/Currents, just tapping the button changes the status. Which beats the hell out of the norm on most Garmin marine units, i.e. tap (or soft key, or Enter) for another screen, choose between on or off, go back to original screen. On the 640, it’s one tap instead of three (or four, if you don’t have touch or soft keys).

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HDS, a major Lowrance refresh

Today Lowrance is announcing a new series of multifunction displays called HDS that I’m excited about seeing at the boat show (and trying when they ship in a few months). The acronym stands for High Definition System, and seems justified on several counts: all the plotter/fishfinders in the series have Lowrance Broadband Sounder technology built in; all have new and more detailed Lake Insight, Nautic Insight or at least an enhanced U.S. basemap built in, and can display every Navionics chart card, including HD Platinum Plus; and all, even the 5” combo model above, can also display Lowrance HD radar, via Ethernet. And there’s more…

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Garmin nüvi 500 & GPSMap 640, yipe!

How behind is Panbo? Well, in July I whined about Garmin’s introduction of the touchscreen Oregon handheld before I’d yet written much about the somewhat similar Colorado. While I’ve been testing an Oregon for some weeks (and still haven’t posted here about it), Garmin has introduced two new handheld/portable units of considerable interest to boaters. One is the nüvi 500 above, a waterproof, multi-mode version of Garmin’s 3.5” touchscreen automobile navigator. Which makes it a direct, and probably awesome, competitor to the Lowrance XOG and Magellan Crossover. Fortunately, the able blogsters at GPS Magazine and GPSTracklog have both reviewed the unit, though neither went boating with one. I don’t think anyone has yet seen the intriguing GPSMap 640…

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Maptech Navigation, another good home found

Above is the new home page at Maptech.com, and while it represents the end of the old Maptech, it sure doesn’t mark the end of the Maptech name. In fact, the blue “Marine Software” tab takes you to a new company called Maptech Navigation. It’s the creation of Peter Martin, who’s worked for Maptech, Chartkit, and as a professional mariner. Martin bought the rights to develop and market Maptech’s digital charts and software packages (except for The Capn, which found its own good home). Martin says his plan is basically “business as usual”…

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A beautiful new helm, in Maine

Two days in the deadline mill and I’m tuckered. But I thought you might enjoy this rather gorgeous helm, bigger image here. It’s the custom Wesmac 50 I mentioned back in June, i.e. the boat on which I got a taste of my writing subject, Garmin’s new autopilot. So let’s forget about that for the time being and take a look at the ergonomics of this dazzling command and control center. My notes:

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The CAPN, good home found

I know a lot of salts, some of them geeks too, who've been using The CAPN for years, and don’t want to switch. I’ll bet they’ll be pleased to learn that this venerable charting software package will now be managed and developed by new owner Star Technologies, as announced here. I had a long chat with principals Bob Strunce and Witt Wittmaack today, and was impressed with what a good home this looks to be. For one thing, Star Technologies really is about rocket science, better yet the software side of it, and has been for some 30 years. For another, Strunce is a serious boater who’s been using The CAPN since 1993, and Wittmaack is Naval Academy graduate with time on submarines. Here’s what they have in mind for The CAPN:

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Planar LX, first impressions

Well, I’m impressed, and you may be too when you check out the bigger image. Repeating the image on that Garmin 5212 (via VGA cable) is a Planar LX1201PTI, one of the marine touchscreen family recently discussed. Both are turned up to max brightness and I did my best to balance the three photo lights arrayed around them. I think the Garmin 5000 Series has become the bench mark of bright touchscreen displays, and to my eye the LX is just a dite less bright, but has slightly more saturated and contrasty colors. The  waterproof and reasonably priced LX also seems well made and is designed with multiple mounting options besides the surface mount I rigged (by snapping off the plastic bezel). Nice.

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Gizmo PAN, adventures in Bluetooth #1

Good times: I spent most of yesterday testing electronics on Gizmo and visiting around Camden Harbor. One system I was mostly pleased with is this little wireless communications and navigation PAN (Personal Area Network), if I may apply a long name for what’s a fairly doable setup these days (bigger picture here). The Palm Centro is running ActiveCaptain Mobile and has the Region 101 raster portfolio loaded on its 1gb micro SD card. That’s a single 353 mg file containing all charts from the Canadian border to Block Island, which scale, zoom, and pan very quickly, and look good. Better than the photo(s) actually, if you put the Centro’s transflective screen in direct sunlight or use its full blast backlighting in heavy overcast conditions.

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LCX-113 #2, a GPS shoot out

Continuing yesterday’s ode to the Lowrance LCX-113, I’ll explain how I’ve been using it to test GPS sensors against each other. Every NMEA 2000 MFD and instrument I’ve tried can handle multiple GPS (and other sensor) inputs, which is good, but they do it with a variety of styles. Some—like Raymarine’s—just grab the first one they see coming down the backbone and use it, unless it pooches out and then they will use another if available (aka “roll over on failure”). Others, like Garmin’s and Simrad’s (NX models excepted), will pick one source automatically but will also let you choose from a list of redundant sources if desired. Lowrance, as I’ve discussed before, goes a little further, letting you use more than one redundant source at once. But Lowrance does something special with GPS, because those sensors send out Dilution of Precision (DOP) values based on the strength and breadth of satellites they’re locked onto. 

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Summer adventures, helped by a Lowrance 113-LCX

So far this season, I’ve had two excellent, and very different, voyages of discovery aboard Gizmo, and the test Lowrance 113–LCX HD has been very useful for both. As shown earlier this month I’ve got it rigged to a small NMEA 2000 network, which feeds the LCX the output of at least two GPS receivers, a Lowrance EP60R fuel sensor, and a Maretron Weather Station, with many add-ons possible. Check out a bigger above image , showing Gizmo up a tidal tickle in Maquoit Bay, about as far into Casco Bay as a boat can go…if the tide is high! The LCX, using just the Skimmer transducer it comes with, had no trouble with these shallow readings, even at 20 knots (once I got confident that the immense mud flats are flat indeed). Notice too the 76 degree water temp, which I’ve never seen in Maine salt water and which partially accounts for the happy bird life in this new preserve.

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Furuno FI-50 instruments, finally here

As of yesterday, Furuno’s FI-50 (aka FI50) instrument family is officially available in the U.S. and Canada, and thoroughly documented at FurunoUSA. I’m a bit chagrined as I thought they’d be out much sooner, in fact chose them for a Pittman Innovation award that was partially predicated on them being out sooner. Oh well, ship dates slip…and I understand that part of the delay was perfecting FI-50 compatibility with Simrad’s somewhat quirky AT10 NMEA 0183/2000 converter. Which is good for anyone wanting to, say, use FI-50s with 0183 wind and depth data already available on their vessel (and especially good, Furuno-wise, for NavNet 1 and 2 owners who want to add the instruments). Plus the premises of my award choice have withstood actually testing some FI-50s for a while…

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Fuel management 6, Lowrance LMF-400

 

Lowrance’s LMF-400 is one impressive NMEA 2000 gauge, and I should have included it in my N2K instrument round up. On the above “fuel management” screen it’s totaling the flows of the two FloScan FloNets and calculating nm/gal using boat speed, while also showing the tank level % from a Maretron adaptor. You can easily change the data fields or build a custom screen showing from one to four data types—either virtual needle style or numeric—and thus monitor individual engine flows (good for catching mechanical problems), fuel used by trip or season, remaining fuel, and range. You can also choose data sources, set up your engine/tank configuration, and calibrate Lowrance fluid level and gasoline flow sensors with the LMF-400; it’s quite visible in sunny conditions; and the little devil can be had for about $120, only $40 more with a flow sensor. In short, it does everything you could want in fuel management, inexpensively (see way below for more details).

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Planar LX, marine touchscreen monitors

Good to see a new player in the marine monitor biz, especially a company as significant and capable as Planar. And they’ve arrived with a bang. The LX Mariner Touch Monitors claim a raft of desirable features, like bonded sunlight-viewable screens, completely sealed cases (IP65), and reasonable prices. They’re not in Planar’s online store or anywhere else I can find yet, but the MSRPs are $2,200 for the 15” model, $2,100 for the 12”, and $2,000 for the 8”, and I’m told the two larger units are available now if you call Planar (Ask for IBU sales). 

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Simrad NX, the only True Malfunction is the N2K

At least one Navico competitor is having fun e-mailing around this scan of a major ad blooper that ran in a New Zealand marine publication. Of course the intended headline was “True Multifunction” not “True Malfunction” and no doubt some one is very embarrassed about the mistake. In fact, “multifunction”—as in multifunction display, or MFD—is not a term that has slipped easily into boating vernacular. The forwarded email that carried this image was jokingly titled “Truth in Advertising” but therein lies an unintended truth. Aside from the blooper, this ad better represents the actual product than some of Simrad’s other marketing.

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iNavX, raster navigation on iPhones

On Saturday the Apple iPhone app store started offering iNavX Marine Navigation and it’s already generated eight mostly positive reviews there. The $50 program is the work of Rich Ray, who also developed GPSNavX and MacENC, and it looks similarly well done. It works with the built-in GPS of the new 3G iPhone of course, but can also be used on older iPhones using cell tower location services. Alternately you can set it up on an iPhone, or iPod Touch, to get GPS, wind info, and other data via a boat’s WiFi router and a program like MacENC (or Coastal Explorer) that can output NMEA 0183 messages to TCP/IP (Franson GPSGate should also work).

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Raymarine A-Series, reloaded

Amongst ICAST’s abundant rods and lures—even a big, lively bowl of live worms—I came across this interesting development: Raymarine previewing an impressively redesigned A-Series, previously unannounced and currently invisible on line. There will be five new models, whose names correspond to screen sizes, sort of. When the series truly debuts in October, we’ll see a 5" A50d, a 5.7" A57d, and a 6.4" A70d (hey, the C70 is actually 6.4" too), all with HD fishfinders built in (unlike the superseded models), plus A50 and A70 plotter-only versions. 

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Furuno SC-30 satellite compass, so sensitive!

That’s a strange, but very impressive fishfinder scroll on the NavNet 3D MFD8 above, and bigger here. You see, Furuno claims that its new SC-30 satellite compass is so sensitive to a vessel’s altitude, which really only changes as it heaves up and down in seas, that NN3D can use that input to remove heave error from its fishfinder screen. I was pretty skeptical about that claim until the end of my NN3D cruise off Cape Cod, when Iker Pryzo uninstalled the SC-30 and showed us how simply pumping it up and down a couple of feet—shown below—registered immediately on the screen above. If it can respond to small, quick movements like that, it can surely detect swells and likely also compensate for pitch and roll, and thus stabilize side scanning sonar. Amazing!

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Garmin Radar & Maretron Compass, puzzles!

Last week I got another brief look at Slancha’s Garmin 18” HD radar in action, only this time I got this screen shot showing its MARPA abilities in action, bigger here . But I’m still a bit puzzled about the implementation, and, as noted in the earlier entry on this unit, can’t find a thing about it in the manual. My guess is that the projected point and time represent the calculated CPA relative to your boat, not relative to the chart. Let’s consider the top right target first, and note that the arc represents where Slancha could be in 3 minutes at this speed. CPA, of course, is figured on the current speed and heading of your boat and the target. So I think that the Garmin is telling us that in 1 minute and 13 seconds the target will be a close as it’s going to and it will be broad on the starboard bow (but when this takes place we’ll be nearing that next bathy line and the target will be near that 11’ bump).

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Furuno NN3D charts, some issues?

The good news is that more Furuno NavNet 3D MFDs are getting delivered and installed; the bad news is that some of the first users aren’t happy with the charts, neither the rasters nor the vectors. For instance, the two empty MFD12 holes we saw a while back are finally filled, but now the owner—Hull Truth poster “PSW”—is wishing he could use Navionics cards in his MFD12s, as are fellow posters “srmote” and “snowpup”. And I know that our own frequent poster Russ was not pleased with his first look at the charts on his MFD8. My own NN3D experience off Cape Cod did not leave me nearly as negative, but I did note some weaknesses. It helps that I like raster charts and am used to plotting on them, but I didn’t think they worked very well on the 8” display, as suggested in the screen above. Some other levels of zoom/chart scale looked better, and some worse. 3D perspective can put more info on the screen—and fast panning/zooming make it all more tolerable—but there’s just no getting around the fact that you’re looking at a large paper chart through an 8” window. The rasters looked fine to me on the 15” display that was also on the test boat, and I’d guess they’d work OK at 12” (but the Hull Truth gang don’t seem to think so).

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Garmin 18" HD radar, the beam width problem

My first time out with the Garmin 18” HD radar was a bit disappointing; Rockland Harbor (try the ‘NOAA’ slider), loaded with bold shore features and boats, seemed overloaded with blotchy targets. It didn’t help that I’d recently been out in another small boat with a Furuno 3.5’ UHD open array that painted targets with astonishing accuracy, even without adjustments. But that’s not a fair comparison (aside from the 4x price difference); the GMR 18” HD, like most any scanner this size, has a 5 degree beam width, while the 3.5’ one has a beam width of 2.3 degrees. I don’t fully understand the transceiver physics, but this ratio of scanner width to target resolution is pretty much immutable in current marine radar technology, and it really makes a difference.

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Garmin N2K, the GPS 17x under-deck mount

Today was my second in a week out on Peter Smith’s Banks Cove 22 Slancha, and I’m ever more impressed with Garmin’s NMEA 2000 sensors and its 18" HD radar. Let’s start with the GPS 17x, which now ships with all 4– and 5000 series MFDs, as discussed in March. Peter chose to use the optional under-deck mount, as seen above. It’s way up in the bow of Slancha, and I’d guess that backing plate at left is under the forward starboard pulpit mount, meaning there’s some stainless steel pipe between this sensor and some satellites.

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N2k instruments, in direct sun

This is the collection of NMEA 2000 instruments I’ve been testing for several months, but here they’re shown in direct sun light (at about 45N latitude, but this afternoon, darn near solstice). Pop up a bigger image of the shot above to see how different they look than when in the shade of a pilot house (or electronics lab). When photographing these screens in controlled lighting I have to turn down the brightness of both the Garmin GMI 10 and the Maretron DSM 250 so they don’t blow out the others, but look what happens here, with everything at maximum brightness (or in the Furuno case, automatic brightness). The transflective Raymarine ST70 is at least on a par with the two other color screens, and the Furuno FI-50s are in a class by themselves, though I think they use the least power of the bunch.

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NN3D in the U.K., and a Furuno USA apology

Seeking the cutting edge of marine electronics—any technology really—can be bitter sweet. On the one hand, for instance, it’s wicked hard right now to actually get your hands on Furuno NavNet 3D equipment here in the States, so hard that Furuno USA just posted a long apology about it. Meanwhile a U.K. Panbo reader and electronics pro has just installed a full suite of NN3D gear, and is exceedingly impressed (as I was after a trip on a Furuno test boat in May):

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Garmin auto pilot, coming very soon

The Garmin GHP 10 autopilot system, announced back in November, looks like it will make its “third quarter” shipping date. It’s hard to tell in the photo—since the GHC 10 control head is so similar to the GMI 10 instrument—but this new Krogen 44 has been a GHP beta site since March. I happen to know the owner, an experienced and technically astute fellow, and thus know he witnessed the install and then used the pilot all the way from Florida to his Chesapeake home port. He says it works well, and particularly likes “shadow drive”, the system’s ability to go in and out of standby just by “feeling” your desire to steer, or not steer, in the hydraulic line (sensor seen below).

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V4 & P+ #3, live tides & currents

Doh! There’s a pall of embarrassment hanging over Panbo HQ today. When I first reviewed the new Raymarine software and Platinum+ charts, I complained that I couldn’t see the live tide and current icons that were an announced feature. None appeared after the “real” reset either, and so I complained to Raymarine. Well, gosh, they were right under my nose: select any regular tide or current icon on a chart, hit OK, and—ta! ta!—there’s a new “Animate” soft key choice. Which gets you to the very able screen above, full size here. Every station in view animates either automatically or step-by-step at an interval you choose, and you can zoom and pan at will. Nice! (By the way, I used the Fish’N Chip chart here because it seemed cleaner-looking at this zoom level, interesting data too.)

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HD radar, especially Furuno's

I have a gripe about High Definition radar, or Ultra HD or Super HD or whatever; as best I can tell there is no identifiable technology, specs, or benchmarks to compare one with another, or even to grasp what it is. But it definitely is something. I’ve seen screen shots of Northstar/Simrad HD that looked good, I’ve heard excellent reports on Garmin’s HD and Raymarine’s, which I also saw myself, though only in tight quarters and flat water. But last week I spent nearly six hours inshore and off with a Furuno UHD 4kW 3.5’ array, and…wowsuh, I was definitely, and highly, impressed.

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V4 & P+, after a "real" factory reset

After I’d written my first impressions of the new E-Series 4.29 software and the Platinum+ charts it supports, I learned that I hadn’t done the “real” version of the recommended factory/master reset. You see, though Raymarine’s own FAQ is unclear about it, a reset done by powering up while holding down the leftmost soft key is apparently different, and deeper, than the one I’d done from the System Setup menu. I know for sure that this is true, as after a “real” reset yesterday, some of the problems I’d seen went away. For instance, I can pull up the System Diagnostics SeaTalkNG sub-menus now without causing a reset, though the device list there remains strangely empty (the new manual says it’s “for diagnostic use by authorized dealers” anyway). Much more important is how the test E seems be performing even quicker and looking better than what I’d noticed the first time around.

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NN3D MFD8, on the water

A guy’s got to ham it up once in a while! But, truly, trying NavNet 3D on the water today had me grinning. I spent hours with that MFD8 because it and its MFD12 mate have become one of the mysteries of this system. Are they as sensationally fast and smooth as the big expensive Black Box version many have been blown away by at boat shows? I threw everything I could at it—UHD radar (very impressive) overlay, hi res photo overlay, dual radar ranges, Sirius weather overlay, ARPA and AIS targets, and mucho zooming, panning, and 2D/3D flipping—and we were often doing over 20 knots and sometimes going in circles. Verdict: no, it’s not as knock-your-socks-off fast as the BB, but it is quite fast, very powerful, and elegant to use. Furuno and MaxSea have created not just a remarkable navigation system, but one that scales easily from center console to megayacht. Sailboats too. More to come, of course.

NN3D & the Q factor, road trip!

Yeeeeha…today I’m driving down to Cape Cod so that on Thursday I can ride on Furuno’s test boat equipped with the geekalicious NN3D network of gear shown above, and bigger here. Hosting the demo will be Brice Pryszo, founder of MaxSea, and his son Iker, who now works at Furuno USA headquarters. I’ll be Spot sharing, taking pictures, pushing buttons, and asking questions. And I’m open to suggestions about just what to ask and look for.

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V4 & P+, first impressions

I’ve been bench testing Raymarine’s E-Series V4 software update (aka 4.29) for a while now, mostly with a variety of new Navionics Platinum+ cards I borrowed. If you’ve read the comments to that V4 post, you’ll know that some upgraders have had to revert to 3.31, and I’m not surprised. There’s lots of changes in 4.29, and even my relatively unstressed test E-120—just a bit of N2K input; nothing attached via standard SeaTalk, SThs, or NMEA 0183 right now—goes a little twitchy sometimes. Like suddenly the 3D rotary controls don’t work unless I do a reset. And it invariably resets when I try to query the new STng (N2K) diagnostic screen, no matter what’s on the backbone. Plus I’ve yet to see P+’s live tide/current icons or the now built-in Fish’N Chip bathy data, despite another 4.29 flash and master reset (apparently Raymarine and Navionics are working on that latter one). However, I’d certainly recommend updating; just be prepared to go back to 3.31 if needed, and be on the lookout for the update to the update surely in the works.

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Maretron DSM250, nice screen config details

I was pleased to find this fine set of gauge configuration options on the Maretron DSM250. Note how you can set the RPM dial’s range, tick marks, and warning colors. Nice! Note too the live demo of the gauge you’re building (there are RPMs and other engine PGNs on the Panbo network now, thanks to a Lowrance simulator). Display customization is one reason why virtual gauges can be superior to real ones, but so far few of the N2K instruments I’m testing take much advantage of the possibilities. You can’t even set the range on either the GMI 10 or ST70 speed dials, which means you’ll constantly be reminded of how fast you can’t go. And, good as the DSM250 is, it doesn’t even have a speed gauge yet, or a depth graph.

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Jeppesen NNS MAX Pro, it's shipping!

It’s been a while since Jeppesen bought C-Map, and even longer since the 9.0 version of NNS (Nobeltec Navigation Software) came out. But the new versions of VNS and Admiral are now shipping, and looking good too (big Admiral screen here). Of course, the major change is that the programs now support C-Map MAX Pro cartography, which is why they’re called MAX Pro and not version 10.  Besides a world portfolio of some 30,000 charts—versus Passport’s 10,000–another bit of nice news is that everyone who currently owns NSS 9 gets a free upgrade to Max Pro, and a free MAX Pro chart region for every Passport region owned, and a free copy of the new Raster Plus Pack. (Owners of earlier NSS versions get various deals, depending, as explained in the press releases.)

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N2K instruments, the big display leagues next?

Check the bigger image; is that not a pretty sweet install, even if I do say so myself? There’s also some interesting screen detail here, like the handsome water temperature graph the GMI 10 can put up. Just behind its Menu button are choices of range and time. But the Garmin does not yet do a depth graph like the ones seen on the IS20 Graphic and ST70. On the latter you can change time ranges from 1 minute to 24 hours with just the left/right buttons, which is cool, but wouldn’t it be nice if Raymarine put the current depth in bold font in that white space upper right? The Simrad graph covers a few minutes and has no controls, but I do like that icon reminding you that the depth is being measured from the keel. All screens, by the way, are at max brightness, except the Garmin, which is at 60%. Next week we’ll see how they look in direct and filtered sunlight. Now here’s a question: if you were photographing these for a powerboat and fishing magazine, what screens would you use?

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NN3D shipping facts, & the Time Zero connection

Can Panbo reader Rolf network the NavNet 3D version of MaxSea Time Zero straight to NN3D radar and GPS compass aboard his Regina 43 (as he graphically dreamed of above)? The idea seems conceivable given that NN3D radar scanners are independent Ethernet entities, and can even bridge in NMEA 2000 sensors, but I’ve confirmed from Furuno that you must have at least one of its NN3D processors in the system. That’s because only a Furuno MFD or Black Box can be the Master of a network, able to “act as a DHCP server and distribute IP address to any other Ethernet device (Radar Antenna, Sounder, Computer, ...).” MaxSea Time Zero is going to work nicely in an NN3D network, sharing charts and all sensor data, but it can only be a “slave” in terms of network architecture (and it also won’t be able to do some configuration tasks like aligning a scanner).

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Simrad IS20s, middle school

If the Furuno FI-50 family featured yesterday are segmented LED old school—and the color all-in-ones can display data any which way (if the page designers get their butts in gear)—then Simrad’s IS20s are the middle school of N2K instruments. Aside from four analog-look dedicated displays (can’t call stepper motor driven hands responding to N2K smart sensors actual analog, can we?), the IS20 family has the Combi and the Graphic displays shown above, and bigger here . As best I can tell they use the same dot matrix screen, but the Combi is limited to four preprogrammed screens showing only the data sourced below left (“position” is really about SOG). In fact it can be installed as a stand alone—just plug in smart triducer and SimNet power cable—and is similarly simple to use.

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NMEA 2000 instruments, ready to rock

So I may be on semi vacation, and having a time, but I’m still looking forward to getting back to the lab where the network of NMEA instruments recently grew to include Furuno’s and Simrad’s latest. Check out the big picture here . I’ll be writing a comparative overview on these five brands soon after I get back, and I’m trying to sort out factors to check out. So far I’ve got:

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Lowrance XOG, first impressions

I’ve actually been testing Lowrance’s XOG for months now, and have become quite a fan. Primarily it’s a touch screen car navigator with voice directions and two gigs worth of Navteq street maps (U.S. and Canada) and three plus million POI’s built-in. But it’s also splash proof and can display all sorts of Lowrance and Navionics cartography on preprogrammed SD cards, or downloaded to your own card from www.map-select.com. What you’re seeing above, and bigger here, is an older Navionics Silver card.

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Another GPS glitch, some Northstars & ? affected

There’s been a slight change in the GPS satellite system and it’s messing up some older Northstar sets—i.e. certain 941, 951, 952, 961, and 962 Navigators, depending on their software version. Northstar has a tech bulletin online, along with a more detailed PDF.

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Faria buys Maptech Touch, & where's Maestro? (Updated)

Today Faria announced that it had acquired “certain marine-related software products from Maptech”, as well as several former engineers. Of course that must mean the Touch Screen Navigator program that Faria is putting into its Maestro System.

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Speeding w/ Simrad, tracking w/ Garmin

That’s me in the tan shirt, aboard the 34’ Yellowfin (run by pro Mark Maus) that Simrad used in Miami to show off its new GB40 and NX systems. I’d already covered their introduction in PMY, here and here, but still have a lot to learn about their details. The demo trip wasn’t a particularly good environment for studying details, but I did learn that both can keep up a pretty good plot even at 63 MPH! Eventually I’ll write more about the monster install in that center console, but today I want to discuss tracking that personal-fastest-ever boat ride with the test Garmin Colorado that was in my bag.

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Raymarine A60, revisited

I remembered this Raymarine A60 today because Jim Hebert just did an up-to-date bench test over at Continuous Wave. I tried the unit alongside a Garmin 545S last summer and wrote about it for last October’s PMY. It also came up when the WAAS satellite change happened and I gather from Jim that Raymarine was never able to fix the RS12 GPS that’s bundled with the A60. An expensive fix is possible, but note that it did well in my testing without WAAS, and that the Raymarine A-Series page indicates that its price has dropped a lot since my PMY piece.

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Garmin GMI 10, first impressions

Good things first: some of the display pages available on Garmin’s new GMI 10 are fantastic, at least as gorgeously graphic and data expressive as the official product photos (like the one we used in the April PMY). Check my real world photo of the speed dial above, which can even have those Max and Avg markers something like the useful Max/Min dots seen on the Raymarine ST70. One button step into the menu system and you could use STW (Speed through the Water) instead of GPS, assuming the paddle wheel sensor is on your network, and a little deeper you’ll find a thoroughly annotated list of all your network devices and the ability to choose which you want as a preferred source. And, yes, that screen is exceptionally color rich and well back-lit (using a direct 12v feed, as Garmin chose not to power it off the N2K network). Altogether, and along with the ST70, rich NMEA 2000 data networking plus color screens and processor smarts equals a great new generation of marine instruments. But!

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Garmin 4- & 5000, what's in the box?

It’s fabulous that Garmin is now including, or at least plans to eventually include, a NMEA 2000 17x GPS and starter N2K backbone with its 4000 and 5000 Series networked displays (even if it took almost a year to get it all together). But if I were shopping for one of these units today, I’d be darn attentive to exactly what’s in the box. The switch from 0183 to 2000 sensor systems appears to be in transition, and I don’t know how far it’s progressed or what may still be in the supply chain (or if there is any price consequence {nice update: “no price change”}).

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HotMaps Explorer, 10,000 lakes for $20!

Well, hot damn! How about a full featured PC planning product that includes maps for 10,000 U.S. lakes, all on a $20 DVD? I just heard about it this morning, but my first impression of Navionics HotMaps Explorer is “who wouldn’t?” Well, I suppose if you never, ever go out on lakes, but I do and was pleased to see that the coverage list includes a lot of Maine lakes. Now my favorite, Lake Megunticook, is not covered by any digital map maker, I don’t think, though I keep hoping that Navionics will do one of its high definition surveys there and let me see at least some of their techniques. By the way, the download of one HD lake map is included in HotMaps Explorer.

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Raymarine E-Series V4, tons'o'freebies

If you own a Raymarine E-Series MFD, you are about to get a lot of free new features—and some new accessory shopping possibilities!—thanks to a V4 software update coming this month or next. The screen above shows the new “steering bar” as well as support for Navionics Platinum+ chart cards and—bigger here—their much improved photo and 3D resolution, even if the docks are on the Cape while the banks are in the Bahamas (for more on Platinum+ check out this video).

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NavNet 3D, taking orders!

Almost every time I walked by Furuno’s demo area just outside the MIBS madness Electronics Room, it looked like the scene above, i.e. full of folks intently learning about NavNet 3D. But while last Fall’s NN3D buzz continued, the negative word around MIBS was that Furuno didn’t yet have a shipping date, and wasn’t even taking orders. “Nice system,” competitors said, “but you can’t get it!” 

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Northstar M84, screenshots & more

Well, I’ll be darned. As Damon pointed out in the screenshot entry, the Northstar M Series also has the feature. It’s not hidden either; I plugged in the lab’s test M121, and the command is right there on the System menu (ahem), and self explanatory. I did hit a snag creating a “User Card”, though; it took a call to Northstar support to find out that it can’t exceed 512 Megs and, sigh, those cost as much as bigger cards these days. At any rate, one is on its way, and soon I’ll put the unit through a Kagstrom AIS simulation.

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eLoran, game on!

Remember all the hand wringing about shutting down the Loran system? Well, the inimitable Langhorne Bond was right again; the USCG’s threat was in fact just smart politics. President Bush’s 2009 budget “migrates” Loran responsibility from the Coast Guard to another Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS) unit called the National Protection and Programs Directorate (NPPD). The budget further states that NPPD will be responsible for finishing the transformation of Loran-C to Enhanced Loran (eLoran). On Feb. 7, DHS announced eLoran will not only back up marine and aviation GPS navigation, but enhance navigation for “first responders” and others operating in difficult GPS environments. This is a big deal.

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Humminbird horizon compass, brilliant!

Some day I’ll figure out how to use the “tag” function built into this blogging software, and this entry will be one of several easily found by clicking “Smart Interface Ideas”. I’ve never seen a compass rose overlaid on a 3D plotter horizon like this, but it struck me as totally intuitive, very useful, and without a downside. Check out the big image and imagine yourself driving up Biscayne Bay toward the Miami River and the MIBS madness beyond. Notice how 3D gives you buoy and bottom detail near your position plus a good, if less detailed, sense of what’s ahead. (In this particular case the bottom contours aren’t very emphatic, but if you look at the 2D raster of the same area, you’ll see there isn’t much depth differentiation around here, and there was probably a tweak we could have done to emphasize it. It’s also evident that the wire frame boat icon is a bit large, putting the green lit mark in the galley!)

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NVTI target tracking, demoed

I wrote about the nifty target tracking abilities built in to NVTI’s high end multi camera devices a while back, but got to see them in action in the MIBS electronics room. The engineer/demonstrator used that show goer’s hot face to show me how the model 6000’s own computer could lock onto a thermal target and command the camera to follow it. In fact, it tracked the poor guy for about 100 feet as a strolled down the aisle, actually felt like someone was staring at him, and then discovered himself on the NVTI monitor. Things get weird like that in the electronics room. The camera was also impressively able to lock onto the end of a swinging six foot radar array way across the room, which made for dizzy imaging, and I bet it would have worked fine with that cold glass of beverage above. Note, too, the ARPA radar targets listed lower left on the screen above. Pick one and the multi camera casing swings to it pronto. And the latest feature is that AIS targets can also be listed across that monitor, subject to instant tracking. Cool!

Ray ST70, hand's on #1

This ST70 not only plays pretty well with the various non Raymarine sensors on Panbo’s NMEA 2000 test network, as mentioned earlier this week, but it’s also loaded with neat surprises. One is those little minimum and maximum dots on the outer ring of the digital Apparent Wind dial above. Many instruments will track min/max of some values, but I’ve never seen one that does it graphically like this. Have you? Plus when you press that menu button from this page, your first choice will be to reset those min/max values. Friendly.

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NavNet 3D, moving toward the nitty gritty

I don’t know when NavNet 3D will actually ship, but the nitty gritty details are emerging. There’s a very useful NavNet 3D FAQ (PDF) up at Furuno’s “Learning Center” (lower right, under Reference Materials). I’ve only skimmed it but was pleased to read how nicely NN3D handles multiple N2K GPS, depth, and other sensors (you pick a preferred sensor and the whole system will honor that preference unless it fails, when a backup will automatically be used). There’s also a good explanation (above) of the blackbox version’s support for multiple monitors, a great feature that’s hardly been mentioned yet by mutts like me. Fortunately, too, a Panbo reader with a strong personal interest in NN3D sent me notes on the FAQ—some enthusiastic, some skeptical, and some perhaps based on misunderstandings. Check it all out and add your own two cents:

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MTW DVD's, dump trucks of data

In our Panbo discussion about how to tune up your electronics and general navigation gear for the coming season, one recurring suggestion was to update your charts and reference publications. Another, less obvious, idea was to get all your manuals in PDF form, which many find easier to search, not to mention stow. Well, check out Managing the Waterway’s 2008 chart and pub DVD set, a phenomenal collection of both NOAA (and Corp of Engineers) charts—every single one available, raster and vector—and the nautical publications made available by various government and state agencies as PDF’s.

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SPOT on, Sail's innovation awards

Friday’s entry may not have been clear; I only meant to snipe at the New York Times (lightly), and not at Spot. In fact, Spot was one of my four picks for the electronics section of Sail’s annual Freeman K. Pittman Innovation Awards, mentioned earlier with other M.E. awards and now out in the February issue (though sadly not on line). While it is certainly not a PLB, I think Spot could be pretty useful on a boat, or ashore. But understanding well how it compares to PLBs is critical, and hence why I’m sniping at confused coverage.

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Standard Horizon CPV550, another look

I only mentioned testing this Standard Horizon CPV550 back in Nov., and that was about a fogging problem that I’m told can be readily fixed with dessicant bags. Now my short review is out in the Feb. PMY, and I’ll add a bit more detail. Neither of these photos really does the screen justice, but above, and bigger here , is the nicely iconic main menu, which also gives some sense of all the tasks this machine can address.

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ActiveCaptain Mobile, in Beta at last

I’m truly excited about the imminent release of ActiveCaptain Mobile, the long awaited heir to the Outdoor Navigator (ON) PDA & smart phone charting program that went dormant two years ago. Of course we got some big hints when developers Jeff and Karen Siegel introduced the ActiveCaptain (AC) web site about a year ago. Now 5,000 boaters are registered there, and together they’ve made some 150,000 updates to its visual database of marina, anchorage, etc. cruising info. So the idea of ActiveCaptain Mobile (ACM) is to be not only an ON-style mini-plotter but also a live-anywhere connection with the AC database.

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GPS & Solar Flares, a real problem?

Last week we saw how a GPS misused could cause a fiery frig up, but can giant fiery explosions on the Sun frig up the whole GPS system? I first heard about this thanks to a small article in the February issue of Soundings. It’s not online, but the research and incidents it discusses are. The phenomenon of flare-induced radio wave bursts interfering with relatively weak GPS signals was perhaps first observed in Sept. 2005, as reported by two Cornell U. researchers a year later. Shortly thereafter—on Dec. 5, 2006–the huge flare seen above caused a burst powerful enough to “swamp GPS receivers over the entire sunlit side of Earth” the next day, according to a scientist quoted by NOAA magazine. Now, it’s not clear to me how many civilians suffered noticeable GPS glitches on that day, or for how long, but I can tell that I first had my ear bent about the need for a secondary electronic positioning system back 2001, which led to this PMY column. The obvious choice seems to be Loran, but apparently our government is still thinking about it. (Let’s hope Class B AIS approval doesn’t take so long!) At any rate, when headed out to sea you might want to check space weather as well as the ocean variety, and of course don’t rely on any one stream of nav data.

Nav software info, in Mad quantities

A subscription-based online boating magazine? Yeah, right! At first I thought the Mad Mariner concept darn right mad. But not anymore, and that’s not because it became a (highly appreciated) Panbo Sponsor. MM has been rapidly building a body of work that’s worth paying for. A particularly good example is their Navigation Software series. Primary authors Diana and Mark Doyle, who also create Managing the Waterway guides, set out to test and review every PC and Mac charting program available, including the free ones, and they’ve done an outstanding job. You’ll never see reviews this lengthy and thorough in a magazine. Actually there’s already a book’s worth of nav software information at Mad Mariner, with just about every program I know of covered, and apparently more resource material and gosh-knows-what to come. In fact, to my knowledge, there is no equivalent book in the print world, and if there is it certainly wouldn’t be this up to date. Plus MM has a lot of other electronics coverage spread amongst its articles and blogs, not to mention something new of general boat-nut interest posted every day. Some Mad Mariner content is available to anyone, and there’s a free 30 day trial of the whole site, but, what the heck, why not treat to youself to a year’s subscription? That’s my mood. As I’ll explain on Monday, I’ve gone and treated my boating passion very well indeed. 

Old instruments #2, Signet's still around

We’re collecting some valuable information and opinions in the first “old instrument” entry (thank you, commenters!). For instance, who knew that Moor/EMS was still around making and servicing their economy grade sailing and fishing gauges (see this eBay store for pricing), some of which will fit holes left by other older brand round models. Plus local installer John Gass wrote me with some tips, like the fact that Signet Marine is still going strong. Actually that company Web site is really comprehensive, even including advanced testing info like the image above, used to troubleshoot a masthead wind sensor. Gass also recommended DMI Marine as “the place to go for Datamarine repairs” and Wheelhouse Marketing as “excellent for older B&G, Leica, and other obscure brands.” In fact, he says that Autohelm ST50’s are about the only instruments he can’t get repaired anymore, which is why he’s hoarding those removed during upgrades. In that dept. he says he usually uses Raymarine or Simrad to replace Autohelms, as the new DMIs are problematical size wise.
    I’m a bit naive about all this, probably becauses almost none of these companies are the sort to send out press releases or even attend the big boat shows. It would seem that DMI, Moor, Signet, etc. have found a comfy niche in what we might call the instrument underground. Who have we missed?

Old instruments #1, Datamarine doubled

This week I’m hoping to find out more about private versus public Search and Rescue call centers (thanks for the interesting comments so far).  But I’m also on another mission, and am hoping for your help. I have a Sail assignment on upgrading instruments. Say your old boat (10 years plus) has broken or tired speed, depth, and/or wind gear, possibly manufactured by a company you don’t hear much about these days, like Signet, Kenyon, Nautico, Datamarine, or International Marine (are there more)? Can you get the old stuff fixed? Is it worth doing? Are there relatively easy upgrades, perhaps using the same instrument and transducer holes, or the same mast wiring? If replacing instruments, how far would you go…some networked variety…color…NMEA 2000? What instruments do you find nearly essential to sailing?

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"Time Zero", the second meaning

If you’ve been studying up on NavNet 3D, or watched yesterday’s video, you’d know that Furuno describes the product’s remarkably fast and smooth charting engine as based on “Time Zero” technology. And it’s so distinctive—especially, say, when you go into 3D mode and freely fly around placing a route, eye-balling radar overlay, etc.—that it deserves a name. However, Iker Pryszo, whose father Bryce founded MaxSea way back in 1985, explained to me that “Time Zero” has an entirely other meaning. In the life of a software program there comes a TIME to dump all the old code and start again at line ZERO. That’s just what MaxSea did some four years ago, even starting with a new programming language (though Iker didn’t say which). So apparently while some developers continued to work on the old code—evolving MaxSea up to its present 12.5 version, plus building the module that can integrate 12.5 with Furuno NavNet vx2 system—others worked on MaxSea Time Zero, the entirely fresh product that launches tomorrow at the Paris Boat Show. 
   Judging from the screen shot above, bigger here , Time Zero is much more like what we’ve been seeing demoed on the NavNet 3D machines than it is any earlier version of MaxSea, despite those familiar icons running down the left side. And I’m told that the two, NN3D and MSTZ, are going to work together very nicely. Plus, simultaneous with Time Zero, MaxSea’s cartography company MapMedia is announcing a wide expansion of its coverage including new vector charts “Powered by Navionics”, with 3D data and photo maps, and new raster areas. Hopefully, there will be much more detail on all this at www.MaxSea.com very, very soon.

NavNet 3D, the buzz continues

Above are Furuno Product Manager Eric Kunz and MaxSea developer Iker Pryszo at METS, where they had good reason to grin; Furuno’s booth was as jumping in Holland as it was in Florida. I can’t recall a marine electronics product that’s ever generated such a buzz. This comment from Milt Baker—“I thought NavNet 3D was the big hit of the Lauderdale show and I believe it will have a huge influence on the course taken by the marine electronics industry in the years ahead.”—is representative of many I’ve heard. And NN3D admirers include the best informed and most critical group I know…the product managers at Furuno’s competitors.

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Simrad NX Series, third time's the charm?

In addition to the networked GB40 series, Simrad also debuted the single station NX series at METS. Again there’s no information online yet, but a student of marine electronics will take one look at the image above and already know a lot about NX. Yes indeedy, I first tested, and liked, that 12.1” screen as the Navman 8120. Then at METS 2006 , when Brunswick New Technologies decided to drop the Navman brand in the U.S., the 8120 became the Northstar M120 and got a 8.4” sibling, the M84. But again, while you can learn a lot about the Simrad NX series by checking these Northstar pages, the units are not exactly the same. You guessed it, the NX40 and NX45 will both support SimNet/NMEA 2000. (Have I mentioned that 2008 is turning out to be the year of N2K!) 

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Simrad GB40, somewhat familiar

There’s nothing online yet, but Simrad did debut its Glass Bridge 40 series at METS. It’s somewhat familiar because it’s obviously based on the existing Northstar 8000i system, but it is not just a rebranded product. For starters the GB40 doesn’t utilize touch screens, instead offering more conventional monitors in 10–, 15–, and 19–inch sizes, and the OP30 controller—which is shown below, and can sit in an inset cradle—is nothing like the 8000i keyboard. Plus the GB40 only comes in a black box version, and that box, unlike the 8000i’s, has a SimNet/NMEA 2000 connector on it. (Have I mentioned that 2008 is turning out to be the year of N2K!) 

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Raymarine SPX autopilots, a big refresh, N2K included

So they’d run out of press kits, and there’s nothing on the Web about them (yet), but there they are—a half dozen or so new Raymarine autopilot models that will be known as the SPX range, and look like replacements for the current range. New features? “Every SPX system comes with rate gyro” included; “Quicker install—no rudder reference required”; “over 10 dedicated fishing patterns” (note some at bottom of photo); and “Access to SeaTalkNG (aka, NMEA 2000) information via the ST70 color autopilot head.” So, given this week’s Garmin announcements and the new Simrad systems, I think we just went from zero to three brands of N2K-talking autopilots!

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Garmin 2008, the complete helm

I’m exhausted maties, but thought you might enjoy this pic of the new Garmin GMI 10, reported on a bit this morning. Garmin now has more detail here, and press releases on all the other new kit here. I’ll try to add more about my imressions in the am.

More 3D & G, are they computers?

So you know I think the new Raymarine G Series and Furuno NavNet 3D are pretty big deals on the high end of marine electronics. But they are computers, aren’t they? Interesting question. I don’t see Raymarine using that term on the G Processor pages, nor Furuno on the NN3D MFDBB pages. But they both have hard drives, they both handle lots of data and graphics very fast, and NN3D even supports conventional USB mice and keyboards. In fact, if you ask the guys who designed these machines, they’re not shy about what’s going on. The G Series run on Linux and NavNet 3D runs on Windows XP Embedded. So, yes, I think these are computers, even if built for the purpose (does the G above look rugged, or what?), and thoroughly locked up against normal PC software/hardware compatibility issues.
   But does even a heavy-duty locked-up computer make you nervous on a boat? I’ve heard some worry about the drives but mind you these are heavy duty shock mounted units, and, besides, it’s easy (if costly) to build redundancy into either system. Both are essentially headless, with all major sensors like radar connecting via Ethernet hub. And both, I think, automatically copy created routes, etc. to all processors on a network. Sounds pretty reliable to me, plus I like some of the Windows related interface features seen on NN3D screens like the fishfinder setup one below. What do you think?

RotoKey, RotoCool

Short of a boat show, maybe the best way to see how smartly the new Furuno NavNet 3D interface works is to check out the Tutorials at NavNet.com. Then you can see how those soft keys above fan as you turn the RotoKey knob, which thus gives you instant feedback about where you are even if the knob is separated from the display. Plus, being a knob and not actual keys, “RotoKey” means you don’t need to move either your eyes or your fingers to access NN3D’s soft controls. Moreover you can choose from several preset levels of RotoKey controls, also customizable, and you can jump right from your favorite set to all commands available for a particular screen with just a long push on the knob. The little icon at the end of the RotoKey label indicates either more choices under it (the arrow head), accessed with a button push, or its on/off status, changeable with a button push. The latter may seem obvious but truth be told the new Garmin interface often makes you do 3 button pushes just to change an on/off condition (steal this idea, Garmin!).
   Actually I’m told that Furuno itself “borrowed” the idea of separating the scroll and cursor controls from the Northstar 8000i (very much alive, by the way), and what a good idea it is. How many man button pushing hours (MBPHs) have you spent just getting a cursor to the edge of screen so it could start scrolling the chart! Jeff McLaren even compares the NN3D interface to high end video games, in a good way, and I suspect he’s right. I don’t know video games but I see well chosen bits of several good PC (and Mac) interfaces in NN3D. And not only is it frankly PC based (dig those left and right mouse button icons on the keyboard), but you can plug in any standard USB PC HID (human interface device), and use it right along with standard controls. Want a wireless RotoKey (and more)? All you need is a wireless mouse with a clickable wheel. Well done, Furuno.

Damn condensation, good gig

Testing that Standard Horizon CPV550 wasn’t the only reason I was on the water yesterday. I was exploring some unfamiliar waters around Cundys Harbor, and it was damn inconvenient to have the big plotter and the Raymarine sounder both suddenly fog up. I’ve had this issue with the DS500X before; Raymarine’s solution was to have me stuff some desiccant bags into the back of the unit, which seemed a little half baked but did in fact work for over a year. Yesterday may have been particularly tough, what with big temperature and humidity swings. I’ll ask Standard about the fogging, but I’ll also write more about the CPV, which I have been quite impressed with.

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NN3D & N2K, sweeeet!

Yes, a first look at Furuno’s NavNet 3D had me burbling “incredibly sexy”—and I will explain that!—but today let’s talk about how thoroughly the 3D system embraces NMEA 2000. For starters there’s a standard N2K connector on each of the three NN3D displays, and the Product Guide lists lots of specific standard PGNs they can input and output (so there should be no Garmin-type data surprises). Now check out a bigger version of the NN3D “building blocks” diagram above to see how many N2K sensors Furuno itself is offering. Besides the FI-50 instruments already discussed, there’s an interesting N2K SC-30 GPS Heading Sensor (said to be reasonably priced and very accurate), an N2K Weather Station, an N2K Smart Transducer, and an N2K GPS.
   Now at least a couple of those are obviously rebranded Airmar products, but note too the odd “Ethernet…dotted line…NMEA 2000” label on the UHD Radar Sensors (mentioned yesterday). You see each of those scanners has an N2K connector on it, able to both power any of the Furuno N2K sensors and take their data, packetize it onto NavNet, and deliver it around the boat (and beyond, if and when Furuno decides to extend NavNet like, say, N2KView). The sensor data coming through the radar scanner is available to any manufacturer’s N2K device via the NN3D display’s port, and I’m told that any N2K data, even proprietary PGNs, going into that port is put onto NavNet. The installation possibilities are pretty amazing. Like radar, weather, and GPS from an antenna mast with only one power cable and one Ethernet cable. At any rate, Furuno may be one of the last of the big marine electronics manufacturers to adopt NMEA 2000, but, man, didn’t they!

Raymarine HD Radar, crisp but not yet Super

So let’s see if I can show you why I called Raymarine’s new high def radar demo “stunning” last week. First take a peek at the 1:10,000 chart for the section of Ft. Lauderdale canal shown above at 1/2 mile radar range, understanding that we were in head-up mode going almost due South, putting what I’m told is a submarine pen to starboard. Now look at the bigger screen photo here, plus the wide angle photo below, taken a moment earlier through a starboard pilothouse window. Feeling the def?  Note the complete lack of clutter around the boat, yet how close and sharply defined the round steel dolphins and low shore are. And would you be surprised that further ahead are a couple of tied-up freighters with small boats outboard and cranes on shore?

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FLIBS, "expensive" is relative

This is turning out to be a big year in marine electronics, particularly at the high end, and FLIBS is always a reminder of how high that end can be. I won’t argue with commenters who find the new NavNet 3D and G-Series expensive, but I might point them at something like this custom helm seen in the Super Yacht Tent. Check it out bigger here, and note the several translucent alarm-coded trackballs like the Palladium model I found in the same tent last year. Palladium, by the way, designed theirs from scratch and says it not related to the “Chameleon” hardware found at a German manufacturer. Whatever, these trackballs are a great idea. The helm, incidentally, was put together by Radio Zeeland DMP, and I have no idea what it cost.

3D & G, wowsuh!

So much to gush about, so little time to gush. Yesterday I got on the water with a full-on Raymarine G-Series system—seen above, 4 monitors fed by 3 processors—and it truly is E-Series on steroids. The interface is E familiar yet nicely improved in some areas…and wicked fast. Plus we got to see Ray’s new high def radar, which was stunning. Then I attended the world premier of Furuno NavNet 3D, which is freaking amazing. It’s not NavNet of old, it’s not MaxSea; it’s something entirely new. The poor photo below was snapped as the Furuno guys replayed a trip recorded in the Cape Cod Canal, high def radar overlaid over an ENC vector that’s mixed with a high def photo map in a good way you’ve never seen before. The tabs at right are a smart new form of soft key driven by a “Rotokey”. I thought the interface, often demo'd live from a 3D black box unit, was incredibly sexy and ran charts faster and smoother than I’ve ever seen before, on any platform. Today much new dope is supposed to appear at both NavNet.com and Raymarine, which is good, because I gotta go.

Maptech Navigator Touch Screen freed, sort of

Ever seen this software before? Yup, that's the same touch screen navigation program that Maptech started developing as the Sea Ray Navigator (SRN) back in 2001, and also sold as part of its own i3 hardware system. Well, things have changed. You still can't buy the program by itself, but Captn Jack's is now offering Maptech Navigator Touch Screen, as it's called, bundled with a Motion tablet PC, and will soon also offer it on a Samsung UMPC (maybe the Q2?). I tried it on the Motion above (bigger picture here, and note that the tablet is inside a splash proof case), and found that it worked darn well with the stylus (though, as discussed recently, I think it will be even better when you can use either finger or stylus). In fact, damn slick with the included EMTAC Bluetooth GPS and non-marine software. (I also tried Maptech Navigator Pro on the tablet and, as fine a program as it is, I found it awkward to use with a stylus.)

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Ray G, hints part 2

Thanks to Richard’s sleuthy comments to the earlier G Series entry, here are some low res images of various G Series system components beyond the monitors. They’re snitched from an online price list (PDF) put up by French Raymarine distributer SD Marine. The text is in French, and not detailed, but I gather that the “Processeur” GPM400 above has a hard disk pre-loaded with Navionics Platinum charts for one large region—you choose U.S., Europe, or ROW (rest of world)—and Gold charts for the others. It also has dual DVI monitor outputs (1280x1024 pixel), two NMEA 0183 i/o ports, a SeaTalkNG/N2K port, and a 100mb SeaTalkHS/Ethernet port.

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More Garmin, and a mouse with MOB button!

Here’s an entering Portland, Maine, screen photo, bigger here, designed to make a few points re: our discussions of the Garmin Guide To feature and the way the big units display data. This is a Combinations screen and it can have one to four windows with most anything in them, plus the Data Bar if you want. Unlike the largely pre-configured dashboard style data on a regular chart window, you can put any number in the system on that bar. On the 5212, you just touch the field to get list of choices; on the 4000 series you just punch one of the softkeys.

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Garmin 5212, what's wrong with this screen?

Last week I got a call from Phil, who’s cruising his Tayana 55 down the West Coast, headed for Mexico and beyond. He “loves” his new Garmin 5212, except for an interfacing bug that he’s hoping someone (Garmin?) can help with. Check the photo above, which shows the standard chart display with its dashboard style numerical data. The way that works is that under the Menu key you have four categories of data that you can set to Show, Hide, or Auto (i.e., show only if there’s appropriate data).  I know from my own testing that Phil has the “Navigation” either on Show or Auto and hence is getting the info across the top, which is putting him right on his long SE leg toward San Francisco, 9 hours to go at 8 knots. He’s also put “Sailing” data in auto mode (and has the 5212 hooked to his Simrad instrument system), which is why you see not only wind speed and angle along the bottom, but also the wind indicator around his boat icon. I don’t know if he’s set Wind to Apparent or True (or if Garmin can cope with Ground/True subtleties), but the real question is why the heck is that boat icon headed North?

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W&P ParaLock Plotter, aka "shortie"

What’s this…a set of parallel rules that didn’t eat right as a child? Nope, the 7.25” ParaLocks were especially bred for taking the lat/long of a waypoint off a paper chart. Put one edge on any handy vertical or horizontal line, spread the rule to your mark (the finger holes help hold it tight to the chart), use the black knob to lock the spread (which can go as wide as standard 15” parallels), and, bada-bing, you’ve captured a measurement you can then take to the edge of the chart or to a scale in order determine a precise latitude or longitude. ParaLocks also have protractor and ruler marks, and do regular parallel rule work nicely on small chart tables and/or small charts, like the 12” wide Maptech Waterproof Chartbook shown. By the way, despite my role as champion of gee whiz electronics, I still like paper charts (and paper guide books). And though I wasn’t a fan of ChartKits when they first came out (um, a couple decades ago), the current versions are great on bigger boats, while the Chartbooks are handy on small boats. Maptech has been doing good work on the print side. Ditto Weems & Plath in the navigation tool dept. ParaLocks are well made and retail for around $22.50.

Garmin's "Where To?", what up?

This photo, of which I’m especially proud (talk about herding cats!), is also a great example of how well Panbo can work with magazine articles. It’s the opener to my October electronics column, in which—thank you, PMY—I had the support to seriously ruminate about testing these four new Garmins. But here online I can show you the picture in greater detail, and write the long caption it deserves.

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Automatic Sea Vision, 360 24/7

Well then, rounding out a week of gear that you may need a lottery win to own, here’s something quite unusual called Automatic Sea Vision. The camera I saw at METS last year looked different than the one currently showing on the ASV Web site, but I’m sure the idea is the same.

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B&G RaceVision 3000, decked out

Being a bit of contrarian, I thought I’d put up another high-end display for Panbo’s nattering nabobs to fire upon (just kidding, fellas). Actually, I don’t know what this new RaceVision 3000 costs—B&G is apparently reticent about online prices—but I’d guess it’s a pretty dear 8.4” ruggedized, touch-screen, daylight-viewable tablet PC. The press release suggests that it’s meant to connect wirelessly to a set of instruments—preferably H3000 digitals via B&G’s souped-up WTP2 Processor—and directly to the Web for GRIB file downloads. In fact, the latest 8.2 version of Deckman, which comes preloaded, includes integration with the nifty Ugrib software I tried a while back. At any rate, a full-on race system with a 3000 on deck could really add up.

Raymarine G-Series, hints!

When Ask Jack Rabbit recently got the goods on Raymarine’s new 12– and 15–inch G-Series monitors, brochures and manuals included, he hinted that perhaps other models or a coming black box would add “storage and processing capacity.” Apparently so, as here’s the “launch” description from the Southampton Boat Show:

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Amerigo mobile nav, open source

Head’s up, open source programmers. Marcello Ferrero has begun the Amerigo project, navigation freeware meant for PC, PocketPC and WinMobile phones and PDAs. A “PreAlpha” release is out, and Ferrero is hoping some nautical code jockies will join him. One feature that he thinks unique will be the ability to use a Smart Phone with camera to create a photo POI in one click, adding categories and text as desired. But I wouldn’t be surprised to see this sort of feature arrive first from ActiveCaptain’s mobile project, still “under construction”, or maybe EarthNC, or who knows where. Does anyone doubt that Web 2.0 will mash up tight with marine navigation eventually? 

Magellan Crossover, a so-so AIO PND so far

I’ve been intermittently testing this Magellan Crossover for months now, and the fact I haven’t mentioned it here is a sign of my ambiguous feelings about it.

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Tacktick Micronet, part 2

I don’t think I’ll be offered a job in any department at Lyman-Morse, but check out how I turned a milk crate and some wood scraps into Annie G’s new electronics test station. On top are the Tacktick displays already discussed, then there’s the wee Garmin 430, and the secret sauce — hard to see — is a Tacktick T122 NMEA Interface.

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Raymarine ST70, looks hot!

Do these new ST70 instrument and autopilot displays (bigger here) look beautiful or what? The problem is that the screens are probably faked, which is typical of this sort of product photography. But Raymarine assures me that they are gorgeous in reality, and may let me see for myself in a few weeks. The official U.S. unveiling isn’t until mid September but again, darn it, AskJackRabbit got the scoop, first finding some dope in England, then yesterday posting most of what went out to dealers…images, manuals, pricing, etc. Perhaps as noteworthy as rich color screens is the fact that ST70s can not only display NMEA 2000 info, engines included, but can also connect to existing SeaTalk instruments and sensors. Plus they mark the birth of SeaTalkNG (new generation), a N2K-like backbone and T cabling system. More on all after I study up.

Furuno NavNet 3D, a teaser

AskJackRabbit got the NavNet 3D scoop, and it sounds interesting. Apparently the hardware is all new, including “digital” radar and several NMEA 2000 sensors (like GPS and weather), but is still backward compatible to some existing NavNet gear. The “3D” angle remains mysterious but Furuno is claiming “You won’t believe your eyes” in a weekly series of video teasers at www.navnet.com, and the ‘lectronic laddies are speculating over at BoaterEd and The Hull Truth.

Tacktick Micronet, part 1

I finally launched Annie G., my Rhodes 18 (named after me mum), and am getting pretty excited about the various Tacktick instruments I’ve installed. I had to drill a substantial hole in the hull just forward of the mast for a T910 triducer that’s wired to a T121 Hull Transmitter mounted just under the mast partners. And I had to modify the old Windex mast-head plate to attach the T120 Wind Transmitter . But I did not have to run a wire down the mast, which would have been a major pain. And of course the T112 Analogue and T111 Dual Digital displays—also wireless and solar powered—don’t need wires either, as I’m demonstrating from my skiff above.

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WAAS weirdness, part III

I didn’t get on the water today (my current PMY column alluding to house projects undone is true, worse than implied actually), but I did find a spot down the street that has a decent sky view to the Southwest where the new, and possibly troublesome, WAAS satellite #51 lives. Which is why—if any neighbors are reading—my truck was parked there with three chart plotters running on the cab roof for a few hours. It can take a while for a GPS to find and download WAAS corrections, which probably explains why I failed to see WAAS differential corrections on the Garmin 4212 last Thursday. Garmin assures me that, “As for the new WAAS satellites, all of our newer receivers include firmware that will recognize these new satellites. It might take a few minutes to discover the new PRNs, but they will be picked up eventually.” And the picture above, bigger here, proves it. There’s #51 and all satellites in use are being Differentially corrected.

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14' of boat, 24" of screen, & more WAAS

Had some fun this morning, showing my friend Jack the Garmin 5212 and 4212 in action while cruising around a very busy Camden Harbor (classic boat races again). Jack’s no geek but has a lot of plotter time, especially on Garmins, and he really liked these new machines, even the Mariner’s Eye 3D view. Now you will see on the bigger image that there are lots of fingerprints on both screens but mostly it’s the photo/sun angle; they weren’t nearly so noticeable in use. Mainly, I think, because both screens are so very bright even in direct sun. The finger prints are particularly bad because some doubter said he bet the screen wouldn’t work if I had saltwater on my fingers. Easy enough to test, and it worked fine!

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WASS wacky, watch out!

I just learned that on July 31 (or July 16, according to this Trimble PDF), the FAA decommissioned WAAS satellites 122 (#35) and 134 (#47), and that at least some marine GPS receivers are not able to recognize the remaining two correction-sending birds, 135 (#45 48) and the new 138 (#51). In other words, your plotter may not be showing your position quite as accurately as you’re used to. Take care, and please report in about your WAAS status. There’s a bit of info about this here, and a good explanation of WAAS here. And maybe you can figure out what the FAA is up to here.

PS 8/4: I’ve added the WAAS satellite service numbers—the # you should see on your GPS’s status screen—to the “PRN” numbers cited above and in the technical notices. Learning those numbers (thanks to Wikipedia) means that the Garmin GPS17 I tested yesterday was seeing the latest #51 satellite, which is the Telesat in geosynchronous orbit at 107W, and may be the only bird visible way up here in the Northeast. #48 is the PanAmSat at 133W and together they are supposed to give most of the U.S. redundant coverage. I still don’t know if the Garmin was actually receiving WAAS corrections. Nor am I convinced that a possible lack of WAAS makes much difference to marine navigation, given how good the uncorrected signals are.

Garmin 5212, sexy time!

Um, speaking of 3D (and one very funny man), I just unpacked and powered up a 5212 and…wow! On first impression I’d say its touch screen control is as smooth and responsive as Maptech’s latest i3 (and that’s saying something). And weren’t there some nice surprises during my first hour. I’m not sure I’m ready to navigate without spot soundings, but Garmin’s Mariner’s Eye 3D (g2 Vision card required) is darn close. Note, bigger picture here, how you can specify hot colors for the hazardous areas. (The ledges at about .4 miles, two o’clock, should show hotter, but maybe that’s just a local glitch. Will check.) Note too the yellow botches of radar overlay; they’re just a simulation here but I’d sure like to see how they work in reality. (I was monitoring VHF as I tested this unit in the lab. Maine’s blanketed in a dungeon fog this evening, but AIS shows the Cat still doing almost 40 knots offshore; it’s hairy out there!). But what really surprised me is that the two lit navigation aids to Camden were graphically showing their characteristics in this 3D mode (see the green dot over Curtis Island to port). I didn’t even know Garmin had “borrowed” that C-Map Max feature. Now all this may apply to Mariner’s 3D on every new Garmin unit, but the screen below certainly doesn’t. Note the very large touch keys, and note how they’re grayed out when they don’t apply to a particular data field. So easy to use; so sexy time!

Garmin NMEA 2000, not really!

The damn devil is in the damn details. Imagine my disappointment when I hooked a whole network of Maretron sensors into the Garmin 4212---no patch cable needed, much plug'n'play goodness expected---and got NOTHING! I can still scarcely believe it, but when I checked the installation manual, I learned that Garmin is hardly supporting NMEA 2000 at all. The page above says, "The GPSMAP 4000/5000 series unit...can receive data from a NMEA 2000 network...to show engine specific information...Also, the unit can receive heading data..." That seems to be it; no other standard data understood, and no data going out. Garmin even screwed up plug'n'play, for some reason needing "Device Instance" and "System Instance" specified, which I've never seen before.

In short---aside from using the right connector, and the right name---Garmin is not even close to supporting NMEA 2000 in the way we've come to expect from Simrad, Raymarine, Lowrance, and others. I am so disappointed.

Garmin's new XM Weather, first impression

I’ve got the new Garmin GXM 31 hooked up to the 545s, and am once again impressed with how deep this “product line refresh” really went. I’ve tested Garmin XM weather on several devices over the years, and saw the interface get better and better. But they threw a lot of it away in favor of an easier, if less tweakable, presentation. For instance, the only control you have over the main chart overlay above is weather on/off, Nexrad animation on/off, and legend on/off. But the data selection is good (yes it rained shortly after that photo), and for more weather you go to the main Information menu where you’ll find a selection of weather presets, each modestly tweakable from the menu key. I didn’t have the manual at first, but pretty much figured out all the possibilties on my own.

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Garmin 545 videos, thanks Bluewaterpirate

I’ve been feeling mighty guilty about my oh-so-slow testing of the borrowed Garmin 545. So it was particularly great to find that a fisherman named Tom has posted a useful series of stills and videos illustrating many 545 features. His Bluewaterpirates Phanfare album may be called “XM Music Functionality” but you’ll find dope on the new Vision charts plus a nice “new section” showing all the XM weather functions using a dramatic offshore low, and more. Enjoy.

Busted, more Garmin smarts

OK, it wasn’t the smartest move, me trying to jam the cable back into a very funky old external antenna while the Garmin 545s it was attached to was still running. Apparently I shorted the cable because, surprise, the Garmin beeped and told me so! I can’t say that I’ve tried this on any other GPS, but doubt I’d get such an informative reaction. One more check on the smart interface list. 

More Garmin, smart menus

I’m getting to know the new Garmins slowly but surely, and one of the many things I like is the way choices you don’t actually have aren’t there to confuse you. For instance, if you start one without the transducer attached those “Sonar” and “Chart/Sonar” buttons on the Home menu above just aren’t there. Similarly, if you go into the Charts menu below without a g2 Vision card in the slot (nifty magnetic latch door, by the way), your choices will only be “Navigation Chart”, “Mariner’s Eye”, and “Chart Setup”. 
  The interface is smart like that pretty much everywhere. In fact, I’d recommend learning this machine first without a card even if you get one with it (assuming you get a unit with built-in charts). But you may very well want to use a card eventually. Garmin has done well at making these MFDs quite good as is, but then piling so many more goodies (like those Fishing screens) into the cards that you’ll be truly tempted. But at least they don’t rub the features you don’t have in your face.
  Now, do you notice anything different about the photo below? I finally sprung for some decent lights and a soft box, and these are my first shots. A bigger crop of the image below is pretty darn close to what the screen and the interesting flecked casing actually look like. And the images should get better still as I learn the gear.  

Faria Maestro, in print and on line

My June PMY column about Faria’s do-it-all PC-based Maestro helm system is now online, along with write-ups of the ACR ResQFix PLB, McMurdo SmartFind EPIRB, Icom M34 handheld VHF, and Cobra 425 handheld (I know, the picture is of the F80; we’ll fix it). Maestro is quite a system, and I’m glad that Faria now has dope about it on their Web site (online marketing is not the company’s forte, but they have strong relationships with lots of boatbuilders, which may be more important in the case of Maestro). Bigger here is the collage below which I made to illustrate some of Maestro’s connectivity. I believe the finished version also has a PCMCIA card slot on the back, meant for a cellular data card.
   Also online are all four of PMY’s June electronics features, including my take on ideal systems (which some of you contributed to back in March). The piece got titled “Perfect Picks” though of course they’re not, which I’ll probably be hearing about from manufacturers at any moment! Meanwhile some of you have asked about PMY’s sale to the “supermarket mogul” Ron Burkle. Well, rumor has it that we may be included in a secondary sale to some other publishing conglomerate, and, besides, we’re doing fine…in short, “business as usual”. In fact I’m writing my 73^rd straight monthly column right now. Year seven at PMY begins.

Garmin 545 & 430, screens & numbers

I really don’t know where to start with the new Garmins (here, here, and here); there’s so much of interest about the interface, performance, and the Vision charts. At least they’re pretty similar model to model, or at least the two I have in the lab. But I had heard—actually in the exercise room at my local YMCA (!)—that the 4” models were brighter than the 5”. My photo above, bigger here, tends to confirm that, though in real life, inside or outside, the difference doesn’t seem quite so emphatic. They’re both pretty bright. And note the resolution difference; the 545 is full VGA, 480 x 640 pixels, while the 430 is QVGA, 240 x 320 pixels. In the larger photo, the difference is particularly obvious on the numeric data; in use, the finer detail of the higher res screen seems evident everywhere.
   But note that Garmin also has a new series of 5” QVGA plotters, which I haven’t seen. The 520, 530, 540, and 550 all have QVGA, while the 525, 535, 545, and 555 are VGA. So, ah ha!, the model number’s first digit indicates screen size, the second tells you what charts come loaded—none, U.S. inland, U.S. coastal, or U.K. (or Australia) in ascending order—and the third subtly tells you what the screen resolution is. (For clarity, the chart on the 430 above is on a card, not in internal memory). Then when get up into the 4 digit networked series, the screen size moves to the last 2 digits, while the first is the style, and second is chart load. Hey, I’m just explaining, not criticizing; coming up with rational model numbers is hard work! By the way, Garmin’s 400500Series page now has a nice “compare” feature.

The photo contest conundrum, great circles!

So let’s talk about issues with the last photo contest. My hope was that someone would figure out that the coral patches, steep drop off, and north facing channel had to be in the Turks and Caicos Islands, specifically the entrance to Turtle Cove, Provo. Then you could refine the boat’s location to 21d 47.806’N, 072d 12.453’W (I can’t get this software to insert the degree symbol so I’m using “d”). Then you’d use some navigation software or machine to create a relative waypoint at 039d True and 3,377 nautical miles (off the contest screen), which—ta-ta—would turn out to be Clare Island, Ireland. You can do this on a Raymarine E-Series but I’m not sure where else. That’s because the E is doing its calculations in great circle geometry, which means that the bearing is going to change as you travel along the course.

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Lowrance iWay 600c, impressions #2

I’ve already written a bit about listening to tunes while navigating the highways on the iWay; how about boat nav? First is the good news that Lowrance has fixed the problem with “obstructions which cover”; you may recall that the “really nasty rock” above, and many like it, were not shown on earlier NauticPath charts. (In fact, the first iWay I got didn’t have them either, but when I piped up, Lowrance said the wrong files were accidently loaded, and sent this one. If you have NauticPaths, you might want to check). Note that the yellow note window popped up when I touched the symbol, and I could get a whole page of info by next touching the “i” icon upper right (ditto with the tides, notes, marinas etc. in the lower image).
   Note too that tapping the “X” upper left would take me out of this pan and zoom mode and back to my vessel (or car), leaving only a map orientation button lower left. Tap that and you cycle through top down/north up (as shown), top town/course up, and 3D. This applies to any type of navigation; in fact, most everything does. Unlike some Garmins—which switch screen sets and units of measurement along with nav mode—when you go from turn-by-turn car nav to point-to-point marine nav, the only other thing that changes is your choice of cartography. Changing to knots/nautical miles isn’t even a choice elsewhere. In other words, as well as the nautical charts are displayed, boat navigation is secondary to auto nav on the iWay (for more check the manuals here). But let’s not forget the 25 gigs of goodies include nautical charts for the whole country, plus a lot of lakes, plus zillions of POIs, street maps, and photo maps. The latter cover many cities, like Boston’s North End below. (I guess I picked that spot remembering my time there a year ago, getting a little ‘treatment’. Glad that’s over.)

i-Blue GPS/logger, wireless & solar too

When Captn Jack’s lent me an i-Blue 757 GPS last month, they were clever enough to put it in “logging” mode before they sealed the box. Thus, once I sorted out the included software and downloaded the saved log points (30,591 of them!), I was able to see the box’s UPS trip from Massachusetts to my house overlaid on Google Earth. Now that’s a damn sensitive receiver that can hold onto GPS satellites inside a box inside a series of brown trucks! And obviously the i-Blue’s 1000mAh Lithium battery is pretty long lived even when it’s not being trickle charged by its 25mA solar panel. By the way, note the lat/longs shown in the i-Blue’s PC utility software below; in Google Earth I was able to drill down to a factory parking lot in northern Taiwan where the unit was probably tested for the first time.
   While I like logging for tasks like mapping island trails, and the i-Blue is certainly an easy way to bring home a visual cruising history, I found that it also serves quite well as a Bluetooth GPS sensor to Pocket PC and laptop charting programs. It even has a unique standby feature that worked fine, and is well explained in this thorough Pocket GPS World review. Note that you use a USB cable to charge the i-Blue and also to download logs and set GPS and logging parameters. I didn’t check if someone without Bluetooth could use the USB connection as a GPS feed, and the otherwise good manual doesn’t say, but I will get another chance as I liked this gizmo so much I’m buying one. I tried an EMTAC Trine Bluetooth GPS that Captn Jack also sells, and while I’d say it’s noticeably sturdier than the i-Blue, I’m going for the lower price and logging capability. I do like how Jack’s is selecting good, better, best products in several categories like this and WiFi, and recommend downloading the new catalog PDF, which seems to include some gear not yet on its Web site.

Garmin 545s, just a taste

Geez, I’m so behind on testing (Cobra radios and Lowrance iWay are the ones half done, and there’s some I haven’t even started, sorry all!), I hesitate to get started on this Garmin 545s. On the other hand, the interest is great, myself included! Above is a backside shot showing the new two-way swivel bracket, and also the ports. Right is a BNC connector for an optional external antenna, middle is a connector for the still somewhat mysterious GXM 31 antenna, and left goes a cable that contains power leads, 2 sets of NMEA 0183 i/o leads, a set of CANet leads, and a power/data plug for the the dual frequency transducer. The unit is not quite as blue as the picture somehow came out, and the tooling is beautiful. The 545s manual is now online for more info, and I will try to show you what it can do as the week goes on (I’ve got a g2 Vision card too), though I probably won’t get it out on the water for a couple of weeks (and, by gorry, I’m going to finish those other units). Meanwhile I include the picture below as a reminder to everyone installing and reinstalling electronics this spring. Be very careful with your screens unless you’re positive that they’re not coated. 

Lowrance iWay 600c, impressions #1

I’ve been using this iWay 600c for a couple of weeks now and there’s a lot to like about it. The turn-by-turn car navigation is first class, and so is the MP3 player. I can’t remember which software I used to rip that Rodney Crowell album, but I just dragged the folder onto the iWay’s hard drive and it took care of the rest, displaying the album cover and track names while sending the sound to my truck’s radio via its FM transmitter. This is not ideal in terms of audio quality, but it’s wirelessly simple and it helps a lot that you can easily adjust the frequency used (those big touch screen arrows at the bottom above) as you drive through sometimes competing broadcast stations. And if you’ve programmed in a destination, or a series of destinations—all pretty easy with excellent Navteq street maps, millions of POI’s on the hard drive, a decent screen keyboard, etc.—the iWay smoothly mutes the music before it delivers voice directions. The navigation/music player combo is pretty slick, and I can easily imagine using it on a boat, at least as a backup plotter. More on that soon.

Si-Tex 15, & a naive idea

I may abstain from off-the-cuff product comparisons for a while! But whereas I’m already in trouble today, I will express my very mixed feelings about the ColorMax 15, which I actually tested. On the one hand, it’s a notable value—a big bright marine multifunction display with a fast processor and a lot of connectivity going for a street price of about $2,100. This unit may not have a standard Ethernet port, but it does have five NMEA 0183 I/O ports, some of which can be set up (see above) to interface with optional sonar and radar sensors (which may in fact talk Ethernet). It also has two USB ports, seen below, though no stated use for them at this time. That photo is also meant to show that the ColorMax may not dim down far enough for night use in some wheelhouses (without a funky fix I’ll cover one day). But what the unit really lacks is a user interface that takes good advantage of the generous screen space and I/O possibilities. For instance, as noted already in PMY, the only way you can get that four way split shown in the promo photo is to have both radar and sonar attached; you can’t even have two chart windows, let alone the sort of page, window, data box, etc. flexibility seen on most multifunction displays these days. Which brings me to this possibly naive idea: if Si-Tex were to open source a stripped down version of this machine’s code, maybe some amateur developers, and/or small resellers, would make it sing?

Raymarine A60, a Garmin blocker?

It seems a bit unusual that the folks at Raymarine just announced a new A60 plotter/fishfinder that they didn’t mention at the Miami Boat Show, but I imagine they’re hustling to meet the Garmin juggernaut. After checking out the A60’s specs, and manuals (where I snipped the diagram below), I’d say it’s a worthy competitor to, say, the Garmin 545s. You get a slightly bigger display, 5.7” over 5”, a killer digital fishfinder, and Ray’s C/E-series soft key interface made even simpler as it’s stripped of radar, AIS, wind, and other elements the hardware doesn’t support. The A60 comes with a Navionics Silver card covering all U.S. waters in almost complete detail, plus you can use Gold or HotMaps fresh water cards. The Garmin, of course, has BlueCharts built in, plus you can get g2 Vision cards with hi res photos and 3D, even add XM weather, but is a 5” screen big enough for that sort of use? (Though note that the 545 sports high pixel density, 480 x 640 versus the A60’s 320 x 240.) At any rate, there’s already a discussion going at The Hull Truth comparing the Garmin with Raymarine’s A65, the similar 6.5” model that preceded this new one (at a significantly higher price). But, watch out, I think FlipFlop425’s post is wrong about the 545s having a digital fishfinder. (And, by the way, are any of the new Garmins shipping yet?)

PS 4/18: Yipe, I made mistakes above! It turns out that the internal fishfinder in the Garmin 545s does use digital signal processing, plus you can use its CANet port to connect to an up-to-2kW GSD 22 module. Also, it and the other smaller new Garmins are now shipping (with the 4000 and 5000 series soon to follow). Apologies to FlipFlop425 and also to Garmin’s media guy (whose Blackberry jukeboxed when it started working again early this morning!).

Murphy HelmView, the many faces of

My April PMY column about Charles Industries, and isolation transformers specifically, is now online. Also up are some new product write-ups meant, in part, to illustrate how companies that traditionally supplied engine and boat manufacturers are now making plays for helm space and consumer attention. One is instrument maker F.W. Murphy, whose HelmView is seen above as part of Volvo Penta’s EVC system but is also capable of chart plotting using its SD slot for Navionics cards (below). This puppy can handled three simultaneous CANbus connections, including NMEA 2000, as explained here, and at the Murphy site (and  also as used aboard a Cruisers Yachts 447). HelmView’s retail price is not trivial, but it might make a super geek gauge.
  I also covered Charles’ new IMcharger series, which has optional helm display and/or N2K output, electronically controlled fuel tank selectors from Parker Fluid Control, and a nifty BilgeWatch8 monitoring system that I still have in the test lab, and will expand on here one day.

Garmin buys Nautamatic, sweeeeet!

Moments ago Garmin announced that it has acquired Nautamatic Marine Systems, the inventors and manufacturers of what’s arguably the most innovative autopilot system out there. When I first profiled the TR-1 Gladiator in a 2004 PMY column I noted that breaking into this niche has to be really hard as experimentation and testing are difficult and reputations are built over decades. Hell, I think even the Furuno NavPilot has gone slowly, despite the great name and what I understand is very good performance. At any rate, Nautamatic stuck with it, eventually began to prove its technology,  and—yeehaa!—just made the big leagues. 
  Naturally a Gladiator autopilot is going to be a lot more attractive as part of Garmin’s already ambitious Marine Network, both to individuals and boatbuilders, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Garmin engineers help Nautamatic shine up its user interface a bit (though the “Shadow Drive” feature needs none). Of course, the bigger picture here is that Garmin—obviously intent on going toe to toe with Raymarine, Navico, Furuno, etc. over serious recreational boat electronics—just stepped a dite closer, ramping up a competition that I think is good for all of us. It’s also ironic that today I’m finishing up my PMY feature on ideal electronics systems! At least I recommended designing such a system so that it is easily modified or even replaced.

Magellan Crossover,

Magellan has not been doing much in the North American marine market recently, and actually this new CrossoverGPS comes loaded with street maps and topos, but you need to purchase pretty pricey chart SD cards to use it on a boat. Nonetheless that little 3.5” touch screen appears to be quite able (don’t miss the demo). I’d like to test it versus the Lowrance iWay 600c, supposedly heading my way for delivery next week. Have a fine weekend!

Bug list #1...Icom, Ray, Garmin, etc....a series?

I’m hesitant about using Panbo as a bug list, but, geez, I’ve been getting bombed with bug reports. So, here goes:

• It seems that some or all Icom 802s, almost undoubtedly the premier SSB marine radios, have a clipping problem as noted here at Lectronic Latitude, and here at Icom itself.
• A reader reports that his Raymarine E-Series Sirius Weather system messes up some NOAA buoy reports, specifically showing oddly high wind speeds. I don’t have a link to this but have seen correspondence with Raymarine which admits that it is their problem, not Sirius’s, and promises “to address it in a future E-Series software release” (which is less aggressive that the reader would like).
• Another reader reports another weirdo: apparently some older Garmins stop sending valid NMEA messages at 23:59:59 GMT. Pascal and others are on the case at rec.boats.electronics. I also got some graphics from a Panbot which showed how a certain BlueChart v8 Bahamas chart was out of whack, putting the routes he’d carefully collected on a Blue Chart v6 into foul waters. They are worth an entry one day to reinforce the point that more than one navigation source is always a good idea!
• Finally, the latest version of MaxSea apparently refuses to open virtual com ports created by the Bluetooth protocol stack, according to ShipModul which makes a nifty BT equipped multiplexer (I’ve been trying). Older versions of MaxSea supposedly do not have this problem.

Si-Tex eLoran, some mysteries

I’m sure I haven’t investigated deeply enough, but I’m mystified by Si-Tex’s eLoran, and maybe you can help. I got excited about the eLoran when first announced, then discouraged that, according to Si-Tex, it only works with their charting systems and P-Sea WindPlot software (primarily for commercial fishermen). Supposedly other companies could develop eLoran compatibility, but none have, as best I know. Then I actually plugged a borrowed eLoran into a laptop running Coastal Explorer and was a bit surprised to find it delivered both GPS and Loran heading information no problem, and might have given a Loran fix if CE was able to convert TD lines to Lat/Long. But maybe not, as that NMEA 0183 LCGLC Loran position sentence seen above may not be kosher. 
  Then I plugged the eLoran into a Si-Tex ColorMax and while it gets a good GPS position, the Loran heading doesn’t seem to work. and I can’t tell if its getting Loran TD’s (the manual doesn’t even mention eLoran), let alone the sophisticated features like RAIM (Receiver Autonomous Integrity Monitoring) described in the eLoran manual (diagram below) . At any rate, I’m talking with Si-Tex technical support, but maybe some of you would check out the eLoran’s NMEA output. A log/text file is downloadable right here. Do those sentences make sense? Any chance you cab feed the data into a charting program or plotter, and see what happens?

PS Today I got a Franson GPSGate log file of eLoran NMEA for download here. While GPSGate is a terrific program, it will not play back this file; another mystery. But maybe someone can find a program that does? 

More I.M.E., good work takes time

We didn’t get a lot of submissions to the Ideal Marine Electronics project last week, but all are juicy. I’m particularly tickled with this diagram, sent in by an English sailor who writes his own blog with some good m.e. content. There are a few items that I still don’t understand, or may be mistakes, but if you look at the full image here, you can quickly see what gear is aboard Enterprise and how it works together. Go here to see the latest submissions, and then try to top Russ with a graphic explanation of your ideal system. Thanks!

How big a radar, anyway?

You don’t have to hang around old salts too long to realize that many consider radar to be the primary electronic navigation tool (even before solid state performance), but I’ve wondered for some time if that wasn’t somewhat an artifact of the days before good chart plotters, not to mention AIS. I don’t mean that either replaces radar, but it seems to me that the primary nav tool has become the multifunction display (which even a lil Lowrance can be these days). Here’s some thinking along similar lines from that old salt Milt Baker:

“A friend with a Nordhavn 62 asked me whether I saw advantages to installing a 20 or 25 kW radar in his boat as opposed to a 4 or 6 kW radar. Of course, everybody knows that more is better.  Or is it?

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New DST reminder, and some tide notes

Today is not exactly like 12/31/1999, but there definitely are some questions about what’s going to automatically understand the Daylight Saving Change tomorrow, and what isn’t. For instance, will your Windows PC? Apparently that depends on update status, and ditto for Macs. Now, I already discussed the update planned for Nobeltec’s Tides & Currents, but it turns out that the 9.1.2213 service pack for VNS and Admiral 9 just finally released today, which seems a bit tardy! (I also understand that Nobeltec is not yet supporting Vista, but I’m not sure any other ECS is.)
  I got wondering about other tide prediction programs. It turns out that at least Coastal Explorer get its time from the computer it’s on. Why didn’t T&C take this easy approach? Well, if a program doesn’t know about DST, it can’t use it when predicting tides in the future. That’s why there’s no sign of the DST change tomorrow in CE’s tide table above, and bigger here, as calculated today. (I also notice that CE is figuring Rockland tides off of Bar Harbor, whereas T&C uses NOAA’s harmonics for Rockland, not wicked important but more accurate). As for all the chart plotters that can predict tides, I think they all base their time on GPS input plus or minus a local, user entered, offset. For instance, if you’re in Eastern Standard Time, five hours later than Universal Time (aka GMT), tomorrow you “spring ahead” to EDT by changing a Raymarine’s offset to -4.0.

Ideal marine electronics, Mac Mini version

I think I had a pretty good idea yesterday, encouraging you all to submit your visions of ideal gear set-ups, but I made it much too complicated. Now you’ll see below that I’ve simplified the categories into classic “good, better, best” terms, and also started (crude) Web pages for system descriptions that come via email. These could become valuable resources not only for my writing projects, but for anyone trying to think through a nav/comms system of their own. Isn’t it interesting, for instance, that the first two submissions in the “better” category represent two quite different approaches and brand choices (both reasonable, I think)? Richard’s came with these photos of his Mac Mini install, and his “Thanks to GPSnavX for giving me the privilege to not have to run Windows for navigation!”, which makes the second time this week that he’s gotten raves here.

Ideal marine electronics, show us your stuff

I’ve already described the premise below, and here are some vague notions of the three categories, plus links to some responses. Please share your ideal gear ideas via comments or email. Thanks.

Good: About a 30’ cruising sail or powerboat doing short hops along coast with the occasional overnight trips; budget/value is important. Submissions so far (3/19/07).

Better: Typically a 40’ +/- cruising powerboat capable of trips, say, up into Canada or out to the Bahamas, including occasional overnight runs; the budget is good but not over the top. Sailboats in this category would certainly include racer/cruisers used for extended coastal cruising combined with ocean racing events like the Marblehead-Halifax and Bermuda races. Submissions so far plus Dan’s sailboat (3/24/07).

Best: 50’ and better bluewater cruisers, sailboat ready for a circumnavigation including high latitude sailing, powerboat capable of ocean crossings and remote explorations; very healthy budget. Submissions so far (3/24/07), plus check out Panbo entries on Bluewater and Spirit of Zopilote.

Ideal marine electronics, the premise

Alrighty, then, time to quit my whining and really put Panbo to work. And I mean YOU! I have a Sail feature assignment to “design ideal navigation and communications gear set-ups” for three different size but fairly typical saltwater cruising boats, and I’m doing something similar in PMY). Obviously it’s a terrifying opportunity to piss off all the manufacturers who don’t make the lists. And it’s also impossible. There’s so much good gear out there, and so many personal variables to what’s “ideal”—simplicity vs. whiz bang, reliability vs. new new, embedded vs. computer-based, single brand vs. many, good value vs. gimme-the-best…etc. etc.
  But let’s give it shot; it’ll be educational. Whether you’re a pro installer, boat owner, or a dreamer, tell us what your ideal set-up would be for. The only categories we’ll go for will be “good, better, best”, sail or power, as detailed in the entry above.  Please submit your ideas in the comments section, or by email for addition to the Web pages I’ll create for each category (and please tell me if I can use your name here and in magazines). Equipment chosen should be at least real enough that you can order it. Of course we’d like to hear about the thinking behind your decisions, and detailed gear lists, photos, helm mockups, and system diagrams are all very welcome. In return you’ll get the chance to share your ideas, a possible magazine credit, and my gratitude.

SharpEye radar...look, Ma, no magnetron!

I kid you not when I say I’ve had my eye on this product for many months. Now some real info has come to Kelvin Hughes’ SharpEye Web site, though you have to register to get at it, and there still aren’t any actual radar screenshots up yet. No matter, this looks like a major development. SharpEye is a solid state radar transceiver that purportedly uses a tiny fraction of the power demanded by an equivalent scanner, yet is radically better at finding small targets in clutter. It also “extracts the relative motion of targets by measuring the phase of received radar echoes relative to the phase of the transmission.” The first shipping product, in June, will only work with large (4 meter!) existing Kelvin Hughes S band antennas, but they’re working on X band, and rumor has it that this technology will eventually come to recreational boats. I won’t try to explain how “monostatic pulse radar” works, because I don’t know, but you can detect the enthusiasm yourself in places like this Navigation News PDF.

Head's up, a nav contest

If you read Power & Motoryacht, you may have noticed a contest we’re running on the last inside page. Each month there’s a beautiful full page photo of a distinctive coastal landmark from the vast archives of marinas.com. Inset is a Raymarine E-Series with screen like the above, only smaller. The challenge is to use the data on the screen to figure out where the landmark is.
  Well, we’re getting more correct answers than expected and I’m especially curious why because I’m making the screens (harder and harder). So help me out; can you figure out where this lovely place is? Did you do it using the screen, or by searching through marinas.com (for a long time), or some other way we never anticipated? Please email me your answers. By the way, the contest has some nice electronics prizes, but, sorry, the entries for this February edition are closed. If you’re good at this, you could always buy the March issue (try a big bookstore, PMY is not into newstand), or a subscription .

Garmin 5xxx, more thoughts

Garmin has put up more press images of the 5xxx series, and this one shows some of the neat 3D abilities I saw demoed in Miami. These machines, and I’d guess at least the 4xxx series too, can overlay radar imagery onto this “mariner’s eye” topside view, and fishfinder imagery onto the separate “fish eye” 3D view. And I don’t mean ARPA targets and fish icons, though they can be useful too. There’s a handsome engine screen too (if you have a NMEA 2000 talking engine, or can use Maretron’s conversion box). The demo units were very much prototypes so I have no idea how fast and smooth they’ll be in real life (actually I’m not even positive which 3D view that is), but they certainly seemed bright, especially for touch screen. I’ve also learned that these 5000 series machines can support a wireless mouse and remote control (4000 series too), which may mollify those folks worried that the touch screen will be hard to work in bouncy conditions. (And I tried faking the Harmony remote into “learning” one of these remotes, which I’m pretty sure it can do). But all this is really just glimpses of Garmin’s new high end; time, and some testing I look forward to, will tell.

Garmin 5000 series for real, and here comes Faria

Now it’s real—or at least officially announced and supposedly shipping in June. Garmin went “no comment” when hints surfaced of the 5000 touch screen series six weeks ago, but here’s a picture (bigger here). The specs on the four 5000 models are very similar to the already much anticipated new 4000 series, except for the touch screen interface. (Which Garmin seems fully committed to; I only see a single power button that casing.) This developement would make my PMY prediction—that Garmin’s Miami booth will be very busy—even truer…if it weren’t for a monster storm messing up many travel plans.

Also here in Miami, Faria will introduce the “Maestro Touch Screen Navigation and Command  Center” (at Booth G65). I got a preview of these 8 and 12 inch units last month, and think Maestro is big news. The key is a Maptech’s really refined touch screen nav software combined with Faria’s skills at manufacturing and at interfacing with all sorts of engines and other gear. If you make it to Miami, check out Maestro (and, heck, the touch screen Northstar 8000i too, which I’m told is finally shipping in quantity). The year of touch screen?

Jeppesen & C-Map, "the game changes"?

As noted earlier today, the deal went down. Above is the scene this morning at C-Map USA’s Mashpee, Massachusetts, office as Operations Manager Chris Cox and General Manager Ken Cirillo unveil their new sign. Similar events took place at other C-Map offices around the world, and a press release went everywhere. The latter is a bit vague, but a Jeppesen spokesperson at the Denver headquarters gave me a little more color on what this acquisition may mean to marine electronics. The most specific item is that Jeppesen Marine’s recreational division, i.e. Nobeltec, will be integrating C-Map cartography into its products, though it may take six months or more, and the fate of Passport Charts is “yet to be determined”. Otherwise C-Map will be “business as usual”—i.e. same partners, sales outlets, and customer support facilities—at least during the six months it will take to integrate the company into Jeppesen. And the notion that C-Map’s hardware manufacturing facilities were not part of this deal, posted here back in August, was also confirmed.
  As for that distinctly non-marine logo, the spokesman said they are working on a new branding scheme, but it’s hard to give up the plane after such longterm success serving that market. In fact, Jeppesen supplies 80–85% of commercial aviation operators with not just cartography, but weather, routing, and other essential data. At one point, the company printed two billion sheets of paper per year (!), though now, of course, this data has largely gone digital. Jeppesen is obviously an aviation powerhouse (and so was C-Map in the marine world), which is why the ad they’ve been running in some of the commercial marine magazines—now modified for C-Map’s home page—has weight. It reads, “What happens when a company with more than 70 years of experience pioneering navigational and operational information management solutions for aviators enters the marine market?…The game changes.” But, despite the hints, I guess we’ll have to wait to see exactly how.

More marine POI review sites, will one dominate?

If you followed my PS’s to the ActiveCaptain entry, you know that the site got quite a drubbing on certain forums and newsgroups, much to the amazement of people like me who actually know AC’s proprietors. Oy! But those threads did lead me to check out some other sites that allow cruisers to create/review POIs for each other. I was somewhat familiar with Marinas.com, but didn’t realize that it has by far the best aerial photography of my homeport I’ve seen anywhere, in fact great photography of ports and lighthouses all over the planet. Registered users can write reviews of marinas but there’s no way to correct marina data, which is too bad as a lot of it is flawed. For instance, the flat statement that “The Camden Yacht Club is private, but may be able to offer reciprocal privileges to members of participating yacht clubs” is flat wrong; the Club is welcoming to all cruisers.
   SkipperGuide is quite the opposite of Marinas.com; it’s very light on content, so far, but users can potentially add almost anything they want, in “wiki” fashion (which it is). In fact, it’s possibly too ambitious; whereas SkipperGuide attempts to cover the whole world of cruising, starting without even a flawed database, it’s going to take a lot of user input to make it seem at all useful. Check out Annapolis, for instance. On the other hand, this site—like the interesting online waypoint, and more, manager POI66–integrates with Google Earth. Are there other sites like this? Will one become the “ebay/Amazon” of marine POI reviews?

ActiveCaptain.com, the POI bomb!

My column about the sorry state of marine Points of Interest (POI) info is now out in the February issue of Power and Motoryacht (and now online). At the end of it I make note of a cool new Web service that was about to go live and that could go a long way toward solving the POI problem. Well, ActiveCaptain.com is really here, and it’s even better than the alpha version suggested. The site was created by the talented Jeff and Karen Siegel, and its goal is to let all of us contribute details of marina services and give them ratings. Other useful POIs, like anchorages, will be possible soon. The Web interface, using Yahoo maps and sat photos, is wicked slick, and totally free. And it will remain free, as the Siegel’s business plan is to develop and sell software that will enable mobile devices like cell phones to easily access ActiveCaptain, while leaving regular Web access free, even of advertising, so that hopefully a critical mass of “captains” will contribute to it. Smart!
   But there is an ironic twist to this story. My secondary objective with the POI column was to promote my home harbor of Camden, Maine, which has a largely undeserved reputation as a tough place to find a good and reasonable berth. Well, wouldn’t you know it, Jeff Siegel himself was the first person to rate a certain Camden marina and apparently it’s the only negative one he’s written so far! But that’s how it works when when conversations gets real. I’ve already detailed and rated Camden marinas myself (full size screen shot here), and am confident that even what’s there now, week one of ActiveCaptain.com, is more accurate than what you’ll find on any electronic chart or in any guide book. Now there’s probably another dreary winter weekend ahead, so take some time to register at ActiveCaptain and add your two cents about Camden or any other harbor you’re familiar with. The more, the better.

PS, 1/27:  Oy, some of the cynics at rec.boats.electronics and rec.boats.cruising have gone paranoid about how ActiveCaptain’s sinister purpose is to “harvest” e-mail addresses. Ignore them! I am absolutely confident that the Siegels will not misuse anyone’s e-mail. By the way, much as I appreciate those newsgroups, they certainly can be sources of misinformation. Interestingly, the ringleader of this particular nonsense is a regular poster/windbag named “Larry”, whose asinine rants about NMEA 2000 already made Panbo. Always ignore Larry! 

PS, 1/28: Oy again; the righteous moderators at SailNet even axed a simple announcement of ActiveCaptain. Isn’t it ironic that if the Siegles had included an obvious revenue source like Google ads on the site, these paranoids would probably be excited about it? Haven’t they noticed business models that include a significant ad-free element, like, say, GoogleEarth?

Lowrance iWay 600c, a slick combo?

The Lowrance press release claims that “the iWAY 600c is the first portable navigation device to offer dual routing capability, allowing consumers to navigate both highways and waterways”, which I don’t understand as Garmin has done that nicely for some time. But that’s not to say that the 600c isn’t an interesting and unique portable-sized car/boat navigator. How’s about a 30 gig hard drive almost filled with U.S. and Canada road maps, hi res sat photo maps of metro areas, 5.5 million POIs, Lowrance’s own NauticPath U.S. charts (hopefully fixed), and some 3,000 Enhanced U.S. Lakes (there is a European model too). Which leaves 5 gigs free for MP3 tracks you can play using the unit’s built in “full spectrum FM modulator.” All is this displayed and controlled by a 5” VGA touch screen for $800 list with 12 and 110 power supplies, suction mount, and USB interface included. The 600c does come out of the automotive division—which is probably why I didn’t hear about it until now (thanks, Barry!)—and while the press release says “waterproof”, the spec page says “completely sealed to prevent internal corrosion.” At any rate, it’s supposed to ship in February and I’m on the test list.

Iris PC radar, a new face

 

Iris PC Radar is a relatively new product purportedly able to “interface as a slave or display-only with almost any radar antenna, and at present can control Raymarine, Kelvin Hughes and the Simrad/Koden/Anritsu family…soon to be more”. Moreover, “its 8-bit digitization gives far superior picture quality and sea clutter performance compared to ordinary boat radars”, and it incorporates a target tracker with AIS input and S-57 chart overlay (screen below, bigger here).  Iris is currently marketed for harbor surveillance and is also integrated into the interesting monitoring and control system FT NavVision, but—head’s up, integraters and developers!—owner Ledwood Technology is “looking for partners to sell and continue to develop the radar.” My sense, by the way, is that 2007 is going to be a significant year for marine radar.

USCG Loran shut down comments, worth making

I still maintain that shutting down the Loran system is a red herring, but the USCG has asked for comments on the subject, and hands are wringing. Here, for instance, is a short piece called “Loran’s Last Chance?” on AVweb. Follow the link where the author writes “The UK has a similar [Loran] system and is also pondering whether to keep it or not”. Not really, you’ll find; what the Brits are actually thinking about is building a new eLoran system!

Nonetheless, it seems prudent for any one who wants a redundant electronic positioning system—and you should!—to register their opinion. And the government has made it easy (though not so easy to give you full links). Here’s the drill: go to http://dms.dot.gov and do a simple search for docket item 24685. You should get to the screen above, which gives you access to the Notice itself plus the comments coming in. Unfortunately the TXT versions don’t word wrap, but the PDFs read fine. Try Robert Gardner’s for some good dope, and I’m hoping my own comment, submitted early this morning, will go up soon. Comment Submissions, button at top above, is a really easy form, and very little ID is required. (Nice work, DOT!)

For more info on Loran, the Wikipedia entry is excellent, and it also got me to an amazing PhD dissertation on the subject just completed by Wouter Pelgrum. He’s the guy who got dizzy on a Massachusetts clover leaf demonstrating how accurate even the somewhat improved current Loran system can be. Now, I’m going to do more testing on the Si-Tex eLoran, already looking good; you think about telling the USCG that we need this capability.

Touch-screen Garmin 5000 Series? I'll be...

Well, I’ll be damned. Apparently Garmin is also introducing a touch-screen version of the 4000 Series, already hot stuff on several counts. At METS I think I mumbled something about how the new large-label interface would work nicely with touch, but no one even hinted that it was imminent. In fact, there’s nothing on Garmin’s site about 5xxx, but a Google search on “Garmin 5212” finds a number of stores taking preorders, including Tiger GPS above (which also has a useful run down on all the new models). Garmin is clearly not messing around in 2007. (Big thanks to Eric for this tip.)

Mind your March tide table, new DST and T&C

There’s something special about this Nobeltec Tides & Currents 3.5 screen shot, bigger here. Besides some sleek improvements to the interface, the program—targeted for release in early January—is corrected for the new Daylight Saving Time (DST) scheme coming to the U.S. in 2007. Yes, in case you hadn’t heard, we are adding a month of DST, now starting it on the second Sunday in March and extending it to the first Sunday in November (with a few exceptions). That will most definitely mess up any uncorrected software or printed tide tables you use, if they are supposedly adjusted for DST. (NOAA used to print all tables in Standard Time because, according to a functionary I once spoke to, they didn’t know how to handle predictions that fell between 1am and 2am on the last “fall back” day of DST, when that “hour” happens twice).
   I know way too much about tide tables from my days as ‘editor’ (data dicer actually) at Reed’s Nautical Almanacs. I still use some of the skills learned to make a couple of newspaper tide tables, like the one below (bigger here). There’s a lot of scripting and Quark XPress tag trickery behind that table, but I get the tide predictions themselves using the nifty data export facility of T&C. Note the difference between 3/11 tides above and below: I’ve marked the new “DST begins” on the table but the data is still wrong, awaiting T&C 3.5.

Northstar discovers cousins, lots of them!

As previewed at METS, the Northstar family has no less than 29 new members, which means that the brand now offers full product suites for most any size boat. Of course most of you won’t even need the bigger image to realize that these are very similar to existing Navman products, only with black buttons instead of blue ones. In fact, my understanding is that most of the 27 ‘new’ Explorer units are exactly like their Navman counterparts, though a few have upgrades like higher resolution screens, and—good news—none have risen in price. 
  The one completely new unit is the M84, at right above, which is an 8.4” version of the Northstar M120, which is essentially the same as the Navman 8120 I’ve been testing. In other words, both of the new M Series units should be able to hook up to either SmartCraft engines or stand alone fuel flow meters to show a nifty screen like the one below (never mind the road shown running over the Fox Island Thorofare—just another one of those chart anomalies we should be on the watch for!).
  So far only the M84 is detailed on Northstar’s Web site, and I believe that all these new relatives may retain the Navman name in certain countries like South Africa where it’s much better known than Northstar’s. Finally, whatever the name, most of these plotters have recently acquired excellent AIS display ability, to be illustrated in a coming entry.

NavSim, new products for sailors and pros

It’s hard to make out until you view the bigger image, but this screen is a Google Map demo of an interesting utility that can guesstimate an ETA for a boat that’s tacking into the wind. It was originally developed as SailTimer, but is now going to be incorporated into a new SailBoat Edition of NavSim’s BoatCruiser. I think that full-on routing modules, like RayTech’s and MaxSea’s, can provide this same sort of real life ETA, based on weather forecasting and a boat’s performance data, but maybe I’m confused?
  Starting yesterday at the WorkBoat Show in New Orleans, NavSim is also previewing a new version of NavCruiser Pro that uses C-Map Max Pro charts. Prior to this product, the Pro format—which looked very powerful in a presentation I attended at the NMEA conference—was only available on the Northstar 8000i, a system I gushed about last year, but is only now coming to market (there were some problems). At any rate, I flew down to New Orleans today, mostly for a Charles Industries product introduction, but plan to visit the Show tomorrow (anything particular I should check out?). Which is why there’ll likely be no Panbo on Friday, but I may get to see NavSim’s latest.

Tiki Navigator, worth a look see

It’s worth checking out this screen shot in all its colorful pixels. Tiki Navigator is slowly gaining a devoted following, largely for its clean and attractive interface. I made this screen show some interesting options like the context sensitive help windows and the function key map, but they disappear completely if you want them to. Tiki only shows raster charts, but otherwise seems to have a lot of features, depending on the version you choose, all reasonably priced.

Optea XLMulti, a boat projector?

Here’s a novel idea seen at METS: a marinized, 9–28v digital projector (front or back) meant to show multifunction nav data in the cockpit or—just swing it around—a big screen movie in the salon. The potential simplicity, not to mention lack of wires and weight, is intriguing, but I’m sure I’m not the only one wondering if any projector can overcome direct sunlight. (Plus, you know the kids are going to make wolf & bunny shadows on your plotter). My sense was that Optea has not yet put the XLMulti into full production, possibly awaiting investors or partners. Your move!

Garmin 4000 first impression: hot damn!

That’s a hand built prototype and not all the software is done yet, but there’s no question that Garmin’s totally refreshed marine line is major news for boaters everywhere. Notes on the image above, bigger here:
* The casing is now aluminum and looks far better than this funky photo indicates, and the 12” screen seems very bright and color rich, even though the suggested retail on the 4212 version—with all U.S. charts, and now Bahamas Explorer charts too, built in—is about $2,670.
* A lot of 3000 series buttons are gone (there really were too many), replaced by eight vertical soft keys. So many potentially wide soft keys mean that labels can be thorough (and easily multi lingual) and menu trees simplified. Note on this specific screen how panning onto a POI automatically suggested the info you access under it (that’s what I’m talking about!), and how there’s a “Stop Panning” soft key instead of the old Quit button that confuses so many new users. 
* The optional, now SD card based, g2 Vision charting shown seems to nicely mimic or improve on many of the features pioneered by Navionics Platinum and the Raymarine E-Series, like variable blend photo overlays (land only or land&sea), street overlay, 3D etc. Garmin adds a 2nd lower resolution world photographic base map (as does C-Map’s Max Pro), and an underwater 3D view that incorporates sonar.
* While not ready for demo yet, Garmin’s new “Auto Guidance” sounds like a smart compromise. You simply choose your destination and the unit will search for all ‘safe’ passages based on your parameters. It will mark those boundary fashion but it will not create waypoints, which might be just too automatic.

I need to get back to the show where there’s something like a 1,500 other exhibitors, but there’s lots more to this story, even more new products than Garmin mentioned yesterday. For instance, how about this first ever 18” 4kw radar—which, like their others, does all its processing within and outputs via Ethernet, and which will retail for only $1,000. Hot damn!

Garmin 2007, feast of features, including NMEA 2000

Well, Garmin (having quite a week) didn’t mess around, releasing marine 2007 preview dope before METS opens its doors. Even an elaborate Flash presentation. Key features at the new 4000 series high end: 12” XGA screen, NMEA 2000 compliance (big news for the protocol!), support for new g2 Vision charts with worldwide satellite imagery and under/over-water 3D, and a brand new interface, including simplified “navigation with Auto Guidance.” A hands on look later, hopefully.

If Garmin's like Apple, will the next Capt. Cook be a geocacher?

Speaking about how terrestrial navigation, at least in some ways, is now informing marine navigation, the big kahuna of non-marine GPS yesterday opened a fantastic looking flagship store on Michigan Ave in Chicago. It looks like Garmin took a cue from Apple—not a bad idea—creating many thousand elegant square feet where you can try all their gizmos, ask questions, take seminars, etc. Shoppers as passionate about GPSs as they are about iPods? Yeah, man!
  Which is interesting. When I bought my Garmin 45 in, what, 1993 (when did that beauty arrive?), I already knew a lot about navigation, like most every other fool who’d ventured over the horizon. Boaters broke GPS! There were years there where I was proselytizing handheld plotters first to my hiking friends, then to my long distance driving friends. But the shoe may soon change feet.
  I’m not sure that our children—weaned on geocaching, location-aware cell phones, arm bands that plot their jogs on Google Earth, who knows what—are going to sit on our knee for a nav lesson. “Hey, pops, do you mean to say that box you paid so much for won’t figure out your route, show hi res photo maps, or connect to the Web for user dock’n’dine recommendations?”

  At any rate, I was honored to be invited by Garmin to the store opening—as a representative of old guard, I guess—but I already had other plans. I just arrived in Amsterdam for METS (starts Tuesday). In fact, I’m looking forward to seeing some new marine machines that Garmin is supposed to preview, but am also hoping to check out the POI advances on their car navigators and PNDs (Personal Navigation Device). I too just recently heard the term “PND”, but I’ll bet it’s not the last time.

TR-1 Gladiator, getting its due

Another intro at FLIBS, this is the new YTS model of the Nautamatic TR-1 Gladiator autopilot I wrote about a few years ago. The new control head is a nice simple alternative to the somewhat daunting 10–button wired remote that is the primary control on other models. As I understand it, you still get the remote and need it to make the pilot do all the customizable maneuvers that get fishermen excited (I’ve also seen it perform a perfect Williamson man overboard circle). YTS, by the way, stands for “yachts, trawlers, and (big) sportfishers”, who are the new customers Nautamatic is trying to attract. The head will help, but perhaps more important is the performance reputation the Gladiator has earned in the last few years, confirmed pretty emphatically by a recent Powerboat Reports shoot-out. Of course you have to pay for that report, but I have and think it’s one of the most well done product comparisons I’ve seen there. Here’s some detail on why they thought the TR-1 performed the best when compared to a Furuno Navpilot 511OB, Raymarine ST6002+G, and Simrad AP16VF:

“We were blown away by every aspect of the product’s performance. There was nothing that we could do to the boat to throw this unit off course. At 2 knots with one motor in gear, we actually had to verify that the sea anchor had opened properly—the boat’s heading didn’t change even a degree. At 15 knots, when we dropped out an engine, there was again no change. It appeared as if the TR-1 program algorithms are monitoring the engine RPM’s very closely and knew what to expect when we abruptly killed an engine.
  Even Nautamatic’s GPS interface exceeded our expectations. At 15 knots, when we engaged a waypoint 180 degrees behind us, the TR-1 immediately put us into an aggressive, but controlled, turn. Nautamatic calls this a G-limited turn. All we can say is that within two seconds, we were spun around and tracking back toward the waypoint before the GPS plotter had time to calculate any cross-track error.”

Nautamatic doesn’t have YTS on its Web site yet, but these feisty folks—who are, um, very confidant about their technology—weren’t entirely pleased with the shoot-out and have their say here. 

Raymarine G's, seriously hunky monitors

Geez, anyone know where the “Big Belly Reduction” Tool is in PhotoShop? Also, what’s the drill when your full res photo reveals a half-naked Florida boat guy? At any rate, here’s another FLIBS product intro, this one splendidly orchestrated by Raymarine’s well oiled marketing machine. Simultaneous to this “VIP preview” event in a nicely shaded and catered boat shed, Raymarine “insiders” got the news via HTML e-mail (you can be an insider too). In fact, there’s no need for me to repeat the awesome specs on the new 17” and 19”, nine-input monitors, nor mention the spectacular prices. But I will point out how neatly they can work with an E-Series VGA Out port (pictured) or a PC running RayTech 6.0, though apparently you can’t do both with the same cool dedicated keyboard. They look similar but one is SeaTalk2 and the other is USB. And I’ll add that a trustworthy Raymarine Product Manager told me that he’s seen these puppies in direct sunlight head-to-head with the competition and with an E-120, and “they rock”.  

Simrad GB60, more than meets the eye

Hey, (brag, brag), who got to be the only unSimrad guy at the dealer/installer GB60 preview (and more here) at Simrad’s Dania Beach office today? I not only learned a LOT about the system, but it was illuminating to hear the feedback from the gents who are going to sell and install these mega systems. I can’t say much more now, as I agreed to certain “off the record” rules, but one thing for sure: the resemblance between GB60 and Nobeltec Admiral is more superficial than I had presumed. Simrad has already done a lot to mold the code into its own more purposeful (Nordic?), and perhaps more stable, vision of an ECS, and plans to add more of its own exclusive features, and simplicities (minus features?), in future releases. Meanwhile, the hardware platform is as powerful as possible, and the worldwide support plan is awesome. I wasn’t surprised to learn that GB60 Product Manager Tim Ryder, with me above, also seems to manage Simrad’s ECDIS…err, make that PLECDIS for “Paper Less”…product. Tomorrow: the actual Ft. Lauderdale Boat Show (if I can still type).

Two old guys, and a Garmin, part 2

So I spoke to “the boys” on Saturday; they’d had a great first sail on their own. Good Enough is slippery, as I saw myself (note the 6.3 knots on the GPS, relatively flat seas in background). And, good news, Jo found himself getting more comfortable with his Garmin. Here's a bigger shot of the screen above, showing some of the things I set up that may be helping him:
  * In Map Setup, the Prefs sub tab, I put Orientation to “Track Up”. Now I know that some salts think North Up, paper chart style, is the only way to go, but I’ve come to believe that head up makes it easier to sort out what’s important on these little screens. That’s especially true on this Garmin (the Navman 8120 too) because Track Up and Course Up automatically put the screen into a “look ahead” mode so you see more chart ahead of the vessel.
  * In the same setup page, Nav sub tab, I set a Heading Line based on a distance of 1 nautical mile. I always set up one of these lines, which I think Garmin should be calling a COG line (there could be Heading line too, like on a Raymarine, but it would be based on compass input). Usually I use time, but in this case, with inexperienced users and those tiny lower right map scales, the 1 mile really helps the eye to understand the current chart scale easily. The effect is pretty obvious on this Split Chart page, which I think is another boon to maximum situational awareness on a minimal screen.
  * Finally, I also goosed up the spot soundings font size in the Labels sub tab, but I’m not sure that helps. I really wanted to enlarge the nav aids but couldn’t figure out a way to do this. Anyone? Or do you have any other ideas on how to make a small Garmin screen as easy and informative as possible? Do tell!

PS. In regard to inspirational old boat guys, I’m happy to report that my buddy Max didn’t last long without one. Plus: Sir Robin Knox-Johnston, who won the first non-stop race around the world, aka the Voyage for Madmen (excellent book), is doing it again.

Simrad GB60, so connected!

Since my first Simrad Glass Bridge post, the company has posted more information plus an 8 page PDF brochure. That’s where I snipped this hind-end shot of its super-connected black box computer (also here in a larger, unlabeled version). Check out the dual SimNet/NMEA 2000 and four serial ports—no multiplexers needed around here! Note too that the GB60 will support up to to two radar scanners (via that built in Ethernet switch) from a wide range especially designed for the system, or can connect to stand alone, even type approved, Simrad radar sets (via the RSI).

I understand that Simrad is hoping to demo the GB60 at the NMEA Conference and Ft. Lauderdale Boat Show, both in late Oct. I’ll be at both myself, and look forward to seeing it. I know that megayacht specialists can build systems even more powerful, and Raymarine has its elegant H6, but isn’t this is the new king of really high-end all-from-one-manufacturer systems?

Tender tracking, good for exploring too

With so many megayachts in the world—some with extra large tenders that they have to tow offshore, some with wild and crazy champagne-guzzling jet-ski-riding charter guests—tender tracking is a big deal. The Nobeltec Admiral 9 Plus Pack looks like quite a complete offering, as seen in these screen shots, and I know that there’s another interesting product about to enter this niche. Some thoughts:
   * I think Admiral can track more sorts of targets than anything else out there: MARPA, AIS, DSC, and now tenders. Won’t other navigation systems follow suit? And what new target type next?

   * The Seetrac transmitter/base station system that works with Tender Tracker (with Transas too) can also send wind info, using an option that sounds like the Airmar WeatherStation. Thus you could send your sailing yacht’s tender out to survey a race course America’s Cup style.
   * By the same token, your tender can also send back depth readings. I’m not sure how they are displayed in Admiral, hopefully as a track of varying colors, but I do know that if you have the optional Bathy Recorder, the tender’s readings can rebuild the 3D data right ahead of your yacht. Yeah, you’d be down $2,300 just in software options (and I can’t find Seetrac prices), but how cool is that! (Actually, has any reader devised a poor man’s way to collect soundings from a dinghy, lead line excepted?)

Nobeltec 9, lots'o'goodies

The above screen shot, full size here, is actually Nobeltec’s Bathy Recorder, a “plus pack” option to Admiral and VNS 8 that Jeppesen Marine introduced last year. I’ve seen these results of a tester’s survey of heavily dredged Port Everglades, and all the ways you can display it, demonstrated at a boat show, and it was quite impressive, though not inexpensive. But I’d neglected to mention this for so long that we are now seeing the arrival of Nobeltec 9! The press release went out last night, marking the start of the Newport Boat Show today (Admiral PDF here and VNS PDF here). Some highlights:

   * Both Admiral and VNS will now display regular GRIB weather files and have new “Nav Info Panels” which can show strip charts as well as numbers. (All seen below and bigger here).
   * Admiral also gets “AIS Filtering” (I don’t know what that means yet) and now include OCENS WeatherNet.
   * Admiral 9 can also support a new Plus Pack called Tender Tracker which integrates with Seetrac hardware. 
   * Either charting package can work with the new Sailing Plus Pack, which can display existing polars, build new ones, overlay laylines and wind info, and provide “basic instrument support for B&G and Ockam instruments”.
   * And either can support the new XM Plus Pack, which apparently integrates the WxWorx PC version of XM Marine Weather with Nobeltec.

So…wow…goodies for megayachts, racing sailors, and all the rest of us who care about weather (more detail and screen shots coming to Panbo soon). And we already know that Jeppesen/Nobeltec has been working with Simrad, and is also in a quiet period while it finalizes a deal to acquire C-Map. Looks like a really big year for these guys.

Simrad Glass Bridge, who knew?

I was somewhat chagrined to open the latest issue of PMY and find a full page ad for an interesting new electronics system I had never heard of!  I guess it’s hard to manage a world-wide product introduction; heck, even searching the Simrad Yachting site for the GB60, as this system is called, yields nada, at least today. At any rate, it’s pretty clear from the pictures and European press releases I found that Simrad Yachting has teamed up with Jeppesen Marine, i.e. Nobeltec. The PR references Passport charts, photo maps, etc. but the screen above sure looks like Admiral to me. Which is not a bad thing. Why reinvent the wheel, especially when you have all the hardware that a big Admiral glass bridge system wants to live in.
   When I visited Simrad a few years ago, I was surprised at how many commercial grade marine computer products they made. Hence there’s a lot of experience behind that dual processor black box PC below. Ditto the keyboard and even the cool arm rest control. Simrad has also been making, or at least OEMing, monitors for a while but these, available in 12”, 15” and 19” sizes, are a new super slim design. I dare say that a full 3 monitor GB60 system, like below (and really big here), will be pricey but powerful, and some will love that it’s all under one warranty. Intriguing detail: the system can talk NMEA 2000 (aka SimNet); will regular Nobeltec charting programs acquire 2000 soon? That would be a good thing.

 

Shanghai dawn, with pretty darn good radar

Crack of dawn, really, and nearly flat calm as we’re inside Cape Cod Bay, Race Point/Provincetown on the port quarter. In the bigger version of this picture you can see some shore lights around the entrance to the CCC, as the Canal is called, from whence that ship emerged. You can also see the remnants of the bothersome light leakage I wrote about the other day, coming off the steaming light just below the compass and a little also off the green running light forward. Note that the engine gauge lights aren’t on because my mate Rich is actually running the boat from below, and Volvo automatically switches gauge lights with engine control (nice).
   But I had been up on this bridge from the very wee hours of the morning and, though it was clear, had much appreciated the quality of the Raymarine radar. Check the screen shot below, full size here; with the E-120 set head up at 24 mile range, that’s Race Point off my port bow, a MARPA target in the ship channel to Boston, and Cape Ann on the starboard beam. I’ve used the VRM to note that the boat’s relatively dinky 4kW dome scanner is seeing the Boston RACON buoy about 32 miles away, which seems quite good. A couple of days later we ran into thick fog when entering Fisher’s Island Sound and learned that this radar could also distinguish little outboard boats at close range, again all settings on ‘auto’. Impressive. I think the scanner may be one of Raymarine’s new models, which they’ve been rather quiet about, but I need to check that out. Eventually I will also tell you about the problems we had with this radar (nothing to do with the scanner).
   In the meantime, have a wonderful weekend, which is a three or four day end-of-summer Labor Day special here in the states. If you’re anywhere near me, you really should check out Windjammer Weekend, especially today’s gathering of the fleet.

Captn. Jack is back, and lookin good

 

I just got the new Captn. Jack’s catalog, which seems pretty quick given that Maptech just took over the operation a few months ago. The online Captn. Jack’s is also back in business, which means I can link you right through to some of the more interesting offerings:

* The fictional Jack is indeed bundling Maptech Chartbooks with Garmin plotters, as above, including putting all the on-paper waypoints into the plotter. Just the product combinations themselves look like decent deals, the waypoints a very useful bit of frosting. (I’m hoping to try the feature out).

* The Capn software (no previous relation to Captn. Jack, and different spellings retained) has now become CAPN Integra AIS, and there’s some more detail on how Maptech plans to market it. Jack is also selling the U.S. Boating Charts DVD, which I have tried (it’s excellent), both alone and nicely bundled with Memory Map.

* Items that I hadn’t seen before, and want to know more about, include inexpensive Xenarc “High-bright” 8” and 10” monitors, a $100 Emtac Bluetooth SiRF III GPS, and the Faria WatchDog monitoring system/service (w/ WiFi/GPRS Internet service coming!).

Note that Captn. Jack’s is offering free ground shipping and a money back guarantee (though a tight one). Altogether it’s a pretty neat catalog, and probably the one most focused on marine computer navigation, though it still doesn’t thoroughly cover the products available. Isn’t it strange that Captn. Jack’s once offered almost every major ECS except the Maptech ones, and now it features Maptech’s even larger roster but is missing major products like Nobeltec, MaxSea, and RayTech?

Navman 8120, test impressions #1

I like putting chart screens in Course or Track Up mode,  except that sometimes they jump around too much. Illustrated above is a nicety I hadn’t seen before, control over how much your track can vary before the screen turns. In a similar vein, the 8120 also has a neat “Static Navigation” control that let’s you set a SOG number under which the speed always reads 0 and COG doesn’t change. {The picture—by the way, and bigger here—is in a style I’m working to perfect: sharply focused gizmo in foreground, soft marine scene as background. That’s a Fleming 55 and a Midnight Lace back there, both lovelies.}
More 8120 notes:

* A negative 8120 surprise was learning that a NMEA 0183 data-in cable is not included in the box (though it is available, and I’m getting one to see how well this MFD will handle wind and other data out of the Airmar WeatherStation). In fact, 0183 seems to be slighted in favor of Navman’s own NavBus. Thus the 8120 will only plot DSC targets coming from a Navman VHF, which is odd as that’s usually a standard 0183 function.
* Build quality of the these early-off-the-line machines is a tad dicey. The first one I got wouldn’t do video and I had to use a blade to open the map cartridge door.
* While I’m normally a soft key sort of guy (which may be a tester’s bias: I use so many different machines that I like to get led through the command structure), I find the 8120 key set and nested menu structure, with its nice big fonts, quite easy to navigate.
* Shown below is a unique (I think) and very desirable display feature; you can vary what Navman calls the Split Ratios so that windows can be sized individually. 
* So far, then, a few pluses and minuses; but there’s no doubt that the 8120 is a lot MFD for the money. I won’t be able to try the SmartCraft interfacing, but it sure looks good. I will eventually test the built-in sonar (the window below is simulated) and fuel flow support. By the way, there’s a nifty promotion going on, but not much longer: if you buy an 8120, or a TrackFish 6600, before 9/1, you can get a free C-Map Mega card.

Digital Radar #2, Garmin open array

Yup, a digital radar double header. Garmin announced this stylish 4kW/4’ open array along with a 4kW/6’ model. Note again the DSP claim, “Digital processing allows for more precise recognition, enhancement, and filtering of radar echoes – making the finished display easier to read and interpret.” I only have one screen shot, taken with the $3,600 4–footer, but it does look pretty sharp (below, and bigger here). I also notice in the specs that these arrays can run at either 24 or 48 rpm, which may mean that the display software will eventually be able to show you two ranges at once, a very nice feature on some Simrad and Si-Tex radars. That’s all I’ve got for now; you all have a great weekend.

Digital Radar #1, Northstar HD

It’s digital radar Friday. It must mean something when two new scanner series are made official on the same day…a trend perhaps? Northstar’s, hinted at last winter,  is called High Definition (HD) Digital Radar. and it comes in 2kW/18-inch and 4kW/24-inch radomes, as well as 6kW/48-inch, 10kW/72-inch and 25kW/84 inch open arrays. They will work with the 8000i series, mentioned yesterday, and the new 6100i update to the 6000i series (and come October, the Navman 8120 will become compatible with the smaller scanners). The press release, not online yet, boasts of “enhanced Digital Signal Processing (DSP) techniques, combined with 10-bit target discrimination, provide unparalleled radar images.” I’ve seen quite a few of those images, and they are impressive. Notice how in the one below, bigger here , the radar is discriminating amongst all those boats moored behind a breakwater in Hobson Bay, New Zealand. Nice!

Ultrasonic Weather Wars, w/ Raymarine as Switzerland

This example will be less funky once I get this whole test rig on the water, but still that’s an impressive screen shot. All that data is coming from, or calculated using, the NMEA 2000 output of Maretron’s weather station, compass, GPS, and water speed/depth sensor. The simulated ‘boat’ is underway but almost standing still (SOG = 0.1 kt) though there’s 0.8 kt of water going by the hull (me flicking the paddle wheel). True Wind then—sometimes called True Relative to Boat—is Apparent adjusted for Speed Through Water and Heading, and Ground Wind (sometimes called True!) is Apparent adjusted for COG/SOG. (A more thorough discussion of True Wind might be in order).

And—yes, contrary to yesterday’s post—there’s Barometric Pressure and Air Temp from the WSO100. It turned out that the E Series doesn’t recognize the standard NMEA 2000 “Environmental” PGN, but will display an alternate PGN that can be turned on in the WSO. This sounds like the screwy stuff that happens with NMEA 0183, and sure enough the E also has an issue with the 0183 “Environmental” sentence, which apparently is marked “do not use” in the NMEA handbook. But Airmar says it’s the only message available for pressure, temp, and relative humidity.

At any rate, the data on the screen below is all coming from Airmar’s all-in-one ultrasonic weather station (and will be joined by pressure, etc. when Raymarine does another code release). True Wind and Set/Drift aren’t calculated because there is no source of Boat Speed, though that would be easy by wiring a speed/depth Smart Sensor into the Weather Station’s Combiner box (multiplexer). Some other day I’ll discuss comparative accuracy, value, etc., but for now I think it’s impressive that the E Series (and C) can interface with both these super sensor systems. The screen shots also illustrate the vastly improved data window control that’s come to the C and E. You can customize the five preset panels pretty extensively (blame me for the asymmetrical graph cells), and use the panels full, half, or quarter screen on any given page. Well done Raymarine, Maretron, and Airmar!

 

RayTech 6.0, first impressions

Actually I’ve been watching RayTech 6.0 for quite a while, as I was kindly included in the Beta testing. I think Raymarine really got it right this time. Take a look at the full screen shot, and consider all the cartography it supports. On the left is Navionics Platinum being read off a CF card in a Navionics USB reader; RayTech seems to speedily support every Platinum feature—including blended photo maps (shown), panoramic photos, 3D, port info, tides & currents, etc. (by contrast Navionics own NavPlanner hardly supports any Platinum features, yet). On the right of course is a Maptech raster chart; other Maptech products supported are photo maps (with variable blending) and topos. Finally, you can also read NT+ charts using a C-Map reader.

And consider how many ways there are to use RayTech 6.0. You can download it for free (yes, available now), grab some free rasters, and you’re all set to plan routes that you can copy onto a CF card and take to your Raymarine C or E, or email to someone, or whatever (see below, bigger here). Or you can buy a Navionics or C-Map reader and use your plotter charts to plan on, or at least compare to the rasters, again taking the routes to the plotter via card. Or you can license your copy of 6.0, and then a single Ethernet cable feeds it everything that’s on an E Series network (Sirius weather, Navtex, and AIS excepted, for the time being). I’m trying both networked and stand alone versions, as well as the Sirius weather, am impressed by all, and will report further.

Bermuda Race, transponders & editors

I suspect I’m not the only guy a little mopy about not being in the huge fleet headed out into the Atlantic toward Bermuda right now. In fact, the usually wonderful iboat tracking system, above, seems to be jammed up right now, I’m guessing with gawkers trying to see who started well. Iboat tracking won a Sail FKP Innovation award last year, and the write up by Deputy Editor Josh Adams is available as a PDF on iboat’s home page. Josh, who is now Sail’s Publisher (oh yes, we writers like that!), is racing on the 65’ Reichel Pugh Zaraffa, while Senior Editor Kimball Livingston is aboard the Open 50 Gryphon Solo, and Roaming Editor Charlie Doane is aboard Avocation, a Swan 48 owned by Offshore Passage Opportunities and chartered by some “Aussie lunatics”. In other words, Sail is covering this race very well. Plus Alex on Finesse is business manager of Sail and PMY, and our blog buddy Eli is racing. Shouldn’t I be meeting these boats in St. George to debrief the electronics?

PS, 6/19: iboat tracking has been working pretty well since Saturday afternoon (though you can see on the full screen that the wind overlay is a mite funky right now). Zaraffa is 1st in class (the biggest class) and 2nd overall—way to go, Josh—and even Finesse is hanging in (though promised e-mails failed to materialize).

PS, 6/20, 8am: The light air has really shaken up the usual leaders list, and the 4am unofficial leader board is showing a freakin Swan 56 as 1st overall, Josh 2nd, and Doane (w/ “Aussie lunatics”) an astounding 20th. Can’t wait to see who the real winners will be.

PS, 6/22: I fixed the link above to the “real winners” list, and it’s now almost totally complete. As of last night, there are still some boats out there, like Chase, skippered by Ocean Navigator publisher Alex Agnew. Also discovered that Kimball Livingston has put a couple of good posts about his Gryphon Solo race.

Sea Ray Navigator...soggy carpet, happy customer

So here’s where I was during some of Wednesday’s Northeaster, on the bridge—tightly enclosed, thank goodness—of Dennis Barca’s spanking new 2006 Sea Ray 44 Sedan Bridge. The occasion was a chance to observe the training portion of the “Red Carpet Advantage” which Maptech includes with that Sea Ray Navigator on the dash, also known as a SRN, and also marketed as the i3. The Red Carpet concept means that if a new owner like Barca registers SRN (who wouldn’t?), he gets an extra year of warranty, for a total of three, and a two hour SRN orientation onboard his own vessel.  The training is wisely scheduled for a few weeks after he or she has taken possession of the boat and has thus had a chance to try the SRN and develop questions. In fact, Barca had already owned a smaller Sea Ray with the first generation SRN on board. He definitely noticed the many improvements in this third edition (well described at Maptech), as did I. The tutorial was delivered by Rick Kilborn, below, founder of a neat training organization called Boatwise, which offers all sorts of courses including docking using your own vessel, and has been contracted and trained by Maptech to deliver the Red Carpet in New England. At any rate, it was too soggy/windy to get underway but I think Barca learned more than he already knew about his SRN, and he’s definitely a satisfied customer (as can been seen better in bigger versions of the pictures above and below).

NavGator, a multi OS charting program

I’ll characterize NavGator Mariner, above, as a work in process. I couldn’t find many normal ECS features, only rasters are supported, and the chart management is crude to say the least. What’s interesting, though, is that NavGator is written in Java so that it can run on multiple operating systems. So far that means Windows, Linux, and Sun Solaris, but others will “soon be released”. The developer also has a Pro version “designed to be the core of the ‘glass cockpit’, where all electronic functions are integrated into a seamless, highly reliable, high performance environment.” The full screen shot is here (also showing off the full 1440 x 900 pixel goodness of my new laptop LCD).

USCG finally kills LORAN?, hopefully a red herring

The May issue of BoatUS magazine has this “Action Alert”:

With no warning to users, the U.S. Coast Guard has proposed termination of the Loran system by requesting zero budget for Loran in its FY 07 budget request sent to Congress. This surprising development came with no stakeholders’ input and after the Coast Guard spent $160 million modernizing the Loran system, an improvement in signal strength, maintenance and coverage that is nearly complete.

Surprise, indeed! For years I’ve been telling folks that an improved Loran will return as a back-up to GPS. What gives? Well, I take solace in the rosy report currently on the opening page of the International Loran Association, well worth a read even if it predates the USCG announcement. According to the author—the inimitable and very credible Langhorne Bond, who I once interviewed for an article about GPS vunerability—Loran has proven itself the perfect complement to the satellite system for marine and aero navigation, not to mention precision timing (for power plants and much more). But he does note that fair allocation of the operating costs is an issue:

The Coast Guard pays the full operating costs and feels this is inequitable due to the future multi-model uses of LORAN.  The Coast Guard is dead right, although the inter-agency discussion of this is likely to be gritty.

Gritty? Ah ha! I’m hoping that the CG budget surprise is not really about killing Loran, but about forcing other agencies to help pay for it. Still, we should all play our part. I’m taking BoatUS’s advice to write my congress people, only I’m adding a line about sharing the costs/giving the CG a break. I also plan to test the loaner eLoran I’ve been neglecting.

By the way, the picture, flushed out by Google images, is a Loran station on Attu in 1945. There’s even a bit of its history online. The USCG has been at this for some time.

Maptech buys ...#2, the plan

Yesterday we learned for sure that Maptech has acquired a bunch more marine navigation products, which must somehow be integrated with all the products it already sells. Heck, the long list at right doesn’t even include its latest offering. Here’s a peek at how it’s going to work as explained to me by Maptech PR manager Martin Fox and others:

* The Capn charting software—apparently the main impetus for this deal—will become Maptech’s commercial level product, with customization and fleet pricing available. Recreational users may be offered an easy switch to Chart Navigator Pro, and certainly won’t be left adrift. Dennis Mills, always the chief developer of The Capn, stays on as Product Manager (and is tickled about it).

* The SoftChart brand, on the other hand, will not survive, but some of its technology will. The plan is not finalized but Maptech may adopt some SoftChart features like its highly saturated raster chart color pallet (very effective on dim monitors) as well as a much less obvious “vertices” technique that improves chart quilting. Supposedly there’s also some interesting vector chart assets changing hands. Like Mills, Dick Davis—director of SoftChart cartography since 1995, and head of NOAA’s raster development team before that—is pleased about where his work has ended up, though he will not be working for Maptech.

* Maptech is “not sure” yet what it’s going to do with MarinePlanner.com, but I recall that the site has some interesting weather forecasting, trip planning, and other goodies (though they’re almost all locked behind a “membership” scheme right now).

* Finally, Captain Jack’s online and print catalogs will come back to life, but as an operation “totally separate” from Maptech. Fox must have used that “separate” word a dozen times, which got me laughing and is an indication that Maptech is a little nervous about annoying its own dealers. At any rate, the new Captain Jack’s “won’t look anything like a Maptech catalog” and its emphasis will be on  “solutions”, i.e. bundles of products like, say, a GPS loaded with waypoints from an included ChartKit Book. I dare say it will also still include a nice collection of PC charting accessories, and that’s good.

Navman introduces NavPix, photographic waypoints

I don’t normally get into car navigation but this is an interesting idea, and it’s from a company that’s very much in Panbo’s radar. The Navman ICN750 above has a built-in camera meant not for snapshots but for easily shooting geopositioned photographs—dubbed NavPix—that you can later page through and select as go-to waypoints. Associated PC software and a NavPix Web site will even let you share such image waypoints with family, or the world. The press release quotes Navman USA general manager Chris Jensen thusly, “We tend to remember images better than we remember addresses. We all know what the Washington Monument looks like, but do we know the actual address? Most of us have commented to a driver at least once in our lives, ‘I’ll know it when I see it!’ Navman, NavPix technology and the global NavPix community set the new standard for navigation simplicity.”

Would this idea apply to marine plotters, where the ‘addresses’ are even harder to remember latitude/longitude numbers? Hell yes. In fact, I think boaters will eventually get all sorts of benefits from the fierce competition for the potentially humongous automobile navigation market. However, that same fierce competition is why it makes some sense for Brunswick to sell off the land navigation portion of Navman; it is not, as they say, a ‘core’ business. But why is Brunswick also selling off Navman’s marine division, already separated into Brunswick New Technologies Marine Electronics (BNTME) along with Northstar and MX Marine? I have heard a lot of rumors and speculation in the last week, but no one really seems to know. Tomorrow I get to chat with David Ritblatt, president of BNTME, and that should be interesting!

Navman 8120, is the "C120 killer" dead?

I don’t know why I haven’t mentioned the Navman 8120 before, because I surely was impressed when I had a chance to fool with it last December. But now it’s particularly noteworthy as the company supposedly has a “For Sale” sign on the door (s). Navman has good online dope on this single station multifunction display that was reportedly dubbed the “C120 Killer” during development, and for now I’ll just note that it really does challenge Raymarine on features and value. What I want to point out today is how very neatly it interfaces with SmartCraft, i.e. Mercury and Cummins engines built by Brunswick. Check out bigger versions of the screen above, and below. Navman told me they don’t like comparing that “Troll control” to cruise control, but have you ever seen anything like that on a plotter/fishfinder/radar? Cool stuff.

Now some questions. If you were buying electronics next week, or advising someone about it (as I know many of you do), would you go for a company that is in transition, even if its product looks terrific? That’s why Brunswick’s announcement seems strange, even dumb. But, what if we learn next week or next month that Navman and Northstar will soon belong to a large and respectable marine electronics company that has never offered navigation gear before? That might seem smart indeed. Have a great weekend.

The power of Zeus, part 3

So what do I mean that the new Zeus propulsion system has nerves as well as brains? Well, hooked into the drive controller is an ultra high precision GPS and inertial navigation sensor which feeds it fast updates on the boat’s location along with which way she’s heading, sliding, twisting, rolling etc. Thus the drive gets instant feedback about how well it’s doing what you asked it to do. In other words, if you’re coming alongside a dock and you push the joystick a little bit to starboard, Zeus will take you a little bit to starboard no matter if the current or wind are pushing you hard toward the dock, away from it, or in some other direction. Zeus can do what the very best boat driver does, i.e. observe what the yacht is actually doing in real time, figure out all the forces involved, and compensate for them to get her to go where he wants her to go. Of course the ultimate expression of a totally integrated drive/navigation system like this is its ability to hold station, which seemed rock solid during the demo. It works so well, in fact, that the Cummins guys say they have put Ingenuity next to dock and stepped ashore—no dock lines (though that will never be an advertised feature). That well!

Now it must be noted that the specific navigation sensor hardware being used on the demo is apparently a very expensive Oxford Technologies RT3000 working with private Omnistar differential GPS corrections, which adds a serious subscription expense. But it’s clear that Brunswick’s electronics division is hard at work trying to provide the needed level of precision by the time Zeus becomes a real shipping system. In fact, Zeus may explain why Brunswick picked up MX Marine, which I couldn’t figure out last Spring. The image above shows a Navman/Northstar auto pilot that’s been souped up to work with Zeus’s amazing capabilities (note how the pilot is neatly showing you what the drives are up to as you cast a line, or take a picture, or whatever). It seems obvious that many Zeus boats will be Brunswick hulls with Brunswick drives and Brunswick electronics—all one—which is worth one more Zeus entry, tomorrow. 

All U.S. raster charts and a charting program, fifty bucks!

Maptech’s freeboatingcharts.com is now offering a DVD with all current NOAA raster charts, all Corp of Engineers river charts, and a real charting program for $50. The charts are organised on the disc into 23 ChartKit-style regions, and this deal even includes technical support. The software is Offshore Navigator Lite, the same program that now comes free with Maptech’s printed ChartKits and Waterproof Chartbooks. It’s not great, but it’s not bad either. I’ll try to write more about it soon, as well as the Zeus thing I started! Have a great weekend.

Airmar Weather Station, really here and really works

I’ve been posting on Panbo for almost exactly a year now, and one of my first entries was about the sailing version of Airmar’s WeatherStation. While I’m sorry to report that that product still does not exist, the powerboat version does and I’ve been testing one. Above, and bigger here, is a screenshot of the PC software that comes with the ultrasonic (no moving parts!) sensor. This particular screen shows the controls available (left) and also what data can be graphed over time. Clicking on any of those graphs switches it to the gauge-style real-time reading. The software is very easy to use but needs some work; for instance, the wind speeds are graphed to a 0–100 knot scale, which means that low speeds hardly show any differentiation. And wind direction history is not kept, which is something that must be fixed for the coming sailboat version (which won’t have a GPS, but will have an inclinometer supposedly able to correct the wind sensor for heel).

But I quibble. There are a lot of neat ways to use the WeatherStation, well illustrated in its latest PDF brochure. I have most of the setup below working (I just haven’t installed the “Smart” depth/speed/temp sensor yet), and it’s a powerful little network. A PC charting program like CE easily collects wind/GPS/heading/air temp coming out of the optional combiner via USB at 57,600 baud, plus the Furuno RD30 (a very handy device) provides alternate data display, and there’s room to run more NMEA 0183 devices into or out of the combiner. Nice detail: according to the WeatherStation manual (another PDF) the combiner favors alternate GPS or heading inputs over what’s built into the unit. I think that means that the built-in sensors can serve as automatic back ups. Nice!

Garmin 478, another big step

I suppose it was predictable, but it’s still amazing. The Garmin 478 above has all the XM Weather and Audio abilities that distinquished the 376C, and it comes loaded with all U.S. charts and all U.S. and Canada road maps. It’s fast too, even the ‘Find’ command is not slowed up by what must be a zillion POIs, nav aids, intersections, etc. stored somewhere in that little casing (and hence I’d bet that Garmin has sped up Find in the first all-U.S.-charts 192C I tested last summer).

Not that the 478 is perfect, even if there is nothing like it out there. For instance, these are the new G2 charts, but apparently the 478 will not be able to show the vaunted perspective view. I do gather from the spec page that it will show the photos available on G2 cards, and the screen above (bigger here) does look richer than regular BlueCharts. But, as good as this screen is, I find myself wanting to plug the 478 into a bigger monitor, maybe use a wireless keyboard and mouse with it too. The unit lets you use an expensive XM subscription anywhere you go but in some of those places, like a boat, you may want to expand the system. Just a thought, probably inspired by how rapidly this unit has evolved over the years. 

I should also add that the Panbo reader who recently complained about the “Surface Wind” coming from XM to this machine was right; it’s old. He tells me that Garmin has acknowledged the problem and is working on it, but I also noticed this time around that you don’t get predicted wind and wave model data, something the new Sirius Marine Weather is very good at.

Garmin also announced a new pair of radar scanners this week, this time inside a smaller, 24” diameter casing, and with more emphasis on the digital processing going on in there. Finally, though Garmin hasn’t yet promoted it, many of its new plotters apparently do support AIS. The 478 is not one of them but I think I’ll soon get the chance to try it on a 3210.

Standard Horizon CPV350, a super combo?

Are you old enough to remember Superman on TV? “It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s Superman!!!” That’s what came up in my fuddled brain when first presented with Standard’s first-of-its-kind what-the-heck-is-that? VHF and chart plotter combo machine. If you look close, the screen above is an obvious dummy, but I saw the unit running in Miami and was impressed. That screen is a 7” wide style—hi res (800 x 480 pixels) and hi bright. The CVP fully supports C-Map Max and its interface looked quite polished up compared to the old CP series (which wasn’t bad). The radio is full Class D DSC with a 30 watt hailer/horn built in, and you can add two RAM+ or telephone style mics if desired. You can also hang a black box fishfinder on this ($1,100 MAP priced) thing, making it quite the all-in-one for, say, a center console fishing machine or a tuna tower, or a sailboat helm. The designed-in ‘handle’ on the right side might be useful in those places too. Of course all the DSC benefits of interfacing GPS/plotter and VHF come built-in, just add an MMSI to get position with distress call, plot your buddies, etc. By the way, that area of marine communications is about to get a boost as Sea Tow rolls out an interesting new marine operator service called Sea Smart. More on that in few weeks.

Remote bottom mapping, who but Lowrance?

Here’s an interesting question: “I am looking for a combo GPS/Sounder for my dinghy, which will record depth data along the GPS track (so we can go out, find the channel, and then bring the dinghy GPS/Sounder to the mother ship and follow the track/depth data).” I can’t think of any truly portable solutions that would work in a rowboat, but I happen to know that this man’s ‘dinghy’ is actually a center console skiff. And that means that any of Lowrance’s recording GPS/fishfinder units, like say a 5” LMS-332C, might do the job. For years now, Lowrance combo units have been able to record your GPS track and sonar imagery to an MMC/SD card (and now to the 20gig hard drives in some units). You can play chart and sonar back on the display itself, split screen like below, or you can put the card in a reader and watch just the sonar scroll on your PC using free viewing software. The picture below (and bigger here) is me trying this feature a few years ago in some skinny Maine waters, and it worked quite well (note: that’s a Navionics Gold chart, not a Lowrance NauticPath). And, by the way, you can also play the recordings back in the nifty PC Product Emulators that Lowrance also gives away. But all this might be overkill in terms of collecting soundings in a poorly charted anchorage. Does anyone know a neat way to collect a depth/position data stream from a small boat, then display it nicely on an electronic chart?

Raymarine in Miami, a "sneak peak"

Raymarine needs a copy editor (Panbo does too!), but otherwise this sneak peek page has a lot going for it. Sirius Satellite Weather is happening on the E Series; C & E get AIS plotting, plus better data and NMEA 2000 engine displays; and the technology under the new 18” and 23” radomes sounds very interesting indeed. Raymarine is also introducing an active RF LifeTag man overboard system. Up to 16 crew members wear the gizmo above and a system-wide SeaTalk alarm will go off if a wearer gets too far from the receiver, or if he/she pushes that button.

PS. I often use Google to check spelling and/or word usage, and am dumbfounded to find millions of “sneak peak” in use, including ABC and PBS. Wouldn’t that “sneak peak” be “the top of a hill or mountain ending in a point” that’s also “carried out in a clandestine manner”? Am I missing something here?

NemaTalker, a tester's friend

My head hurts! I’ve got 11 ECS packages installed here now, and I’ve been fooling with them on two computers for the last several days. Would you be surprised to hear that Windows XP has occasionally crashed, sometimes violently, and not everything plays together nicely? Like when I start Nobeltec Admiral 8.1, MaxSea 12.2 also tries to start! I have the two computers connected with a null serial cable, meaning I can run NemaTalker (a great utility from SailSoft) on either one and an ECS running on the other thinks it hears, say, the virtual GPS above, which I control, plus a sounder, compass, etc.. In other words, I can ‘drive’ the boat on one screen, and plot the results on another. It’s geek fun for sure and a better way to test an ECS than with its built-in simulator/DR function. Unfortunately NemaTalker (full screen here) does not send AIS targets, and there aren’t many where I live, but one ECS provides its own test AIS in a very interesting way, explained tomorrow.

Northstar 8000i, new radar too

The Northstar 8000i will get a lot of attention in Miami. In fact, I just scratched the surface when I profiled its touch screen technology and overall architecture in early January. For instance, I didn’t mention the radar scanners, which are entirely new. The hardware is from JRC, the software from Northstar [correction: Northstar also designed the processor hardware], and I’m told that the results are amazing. At any rate, a British company has just put up the Northstar 2006 catalog, which has the best material I’ve seen yet on the 8000i. It’s a 3 meg .pdf file here.

ECS roundup, your suggestions please!

I was so wet behind the ears! One my first attempts at magazine writing was an overview of Electronic Charting Systems (ECS) for the Sept/Oct 1999 issue of Ocean Navigator. I spent months doing the research, actually installing and testing all eleven programs above (table bigger here), and wrote some 11,000 words on the subject. I recall that ON was surprised at the size of it, but published almost the whole thing (some is still online, titled "Power navigation", though you’ll need a subscription to read it).

At any rate—though I’ve tried to avoid big overview articles, particularly about ECS, ever since—I’m about to write one for Sail (which I’ll probably modify at some point for PMY). I’ve got to fit it in 2,000 words/six pages, and my idea is to highlight a good selection of particularly well done features, hopefully in as many different programs as possible. It goes with the idea that there is no perfect program for everyone, and that you can learn a lot about what’s possible via diligent shopping. I’d love your help. What do you think Nobeltec VNS, or Coastal Navigator, or RayTech or whatever does particularly well? And what ECS features are important to you, anyway? Please post ideas in the comments or just e-mail me. Developer comments welcome too.

Northstar 8000i, the touch screen

Touch screen does seem like “the natural interface” (as I just read at some promotional site), but there are two gripes about using it on the water: one, the technology can reduce precious screen brightness 10–20%, and, two, it’s hard to use when a boat starts bouncing around. Northstar has addressed both issues:

* The 8000i uses an unusual infrared touch screen technology; LEDs and photo cells hidden in the bezel create a invisible light grid which your fingertip interrupts. It seemed to work quite nicely during my demo and it doesn’t reduce screen brightness at all. Supposedly even gloved fingers and sticky fish scales won’t phase it. By the way, in the picture above (bigger here), the 8000i is zooming out by tapping a desired new center spot (red target) and dragging a box from lower right to upper left to define the zoom level. Left to right zooms in, the shaded borders let you pan, and all those touch keys can be hidden with the upper right ‘min’ button.

* But there are also zoom ‘in’ and ‘out’ buttons built right into the 12” 8000i, or you can plug in the dedicated key board seen in the system diagram with the 15” model, or you can use any other USB keyboard or pointing device. Interface flexibility!

This 12” unit, incidently, contains a 1.2 GHz processor and a 35 gig hard drive in addition to what seemed like a very bright screen, and it’s completely sealed. Yet, after a couple of hours of use, its relatively shallow aluminum back casing was barely warm, which I thought impressive, and a sign of durability.

Northstar 8000i, the architecture

The 8000i has a lot of sizzle, and some interesting new charts, but let’s start coverage with a system overview (bigger here):

* The sunlight viewable multifunction displays are Windows PCs; the 12” is self contained while the 15” is broken into monitor, processor, and keyboard modules. (Both units are also touch screen, but more on that later).

* This is a ‘masterless’ network, meaning that sounder, radar, cameras, and even the various sensor networks go directly to an Ethernet hub. If one PC is shut down, or craps out, it should not affect what the others can do. Several manufacturers have network black box sounders, and a couple have Ethernet radars, but this is the first time I’ve seen network cameras or a Network Interface Bridge (USB, SmartCraft, and NMEA 0183, with—hooray!—NMEA 2000 coming in the fall).

* The only exception to this ‘masterless’ design is that only one processor can be an entertainment server, burning CDs and DVDs with the built in ‘jukebox’ software. But then any display can play from the music and movie library at will, audio going to a nearby stereo and video either playing right on the 8000i screen or on a TV.

* All the parts shown, and the necessary cabling, are supposedly waterproof and marine tough.

Yes, it’s expensive—the 12” retails at $7,000–-but the 8000i looks like a smartly designed system, with a lot of redundancy, power, flexibility, and pizazz built in. More details to come.

The first chart plotter, 1985 & Italian

C-Map owns this ‘historic’ machine, which is supposedly the first chart plotter (bigger here) ever sold in the U.S. That was around 1985, when Navionics founders Giuseppe Carnevali and Fosco Bianchetti developed the first crude vector charts and this Datamarine-labeled plotter to show them. (Bianchetti soon went off to found C-Map). Wasn’t it about 5 years later that the first PC charting program came out? At any rate, we’ve come a hell of long ways in 20 years, and Carnevali and Bianchetti—who still run their companies—deserve some of the credit.

Now, would anyone care to predict what marine electronics will look like in another 20 years? 10? 5? With that, I wish you all a wonderful new year.

Outdoor Navigator becomes Activemap, and free

NOAA’s free chart policy strikes again! Maptech will no longer sell  Outdoor Navigator, the nifty PDA (both PocketPC and Palm) and Smartphone charting program sort of shown above. The developer, Jeffrey Siegel, has decided to go independent, largely because he can now freely access U.S. raster charts and topo maps. Moreover, the program, to be called activemap, will also be free. I don’t quite understand the business plan, if there is one, but am quite sure that Jeff and his team are up to something interesting. More as available.

CruzPro, the big little company you never heard of

You have seen their technology embedded in other guys’ products for years. This New Zealand company produces a wide range of sensors and instruments for your boat. They make great aftermarket installations for boats that were not originally equipped with the sensor you want. Their products range from tank levels, RPM, pressure, etc. The thing that caught my eye was how many devices they offer, all packaged in nice, common format displays. Check them out at www.cruzpro.com. — Jeff Hummel

Note that CruzPro has also developed a black box fishfinder for PCs, and NMEA 0183 ‘Active’ transducers, similar to Airmar ‘Smarts’.

Northstar Pilot, a Navman winner

The wise judges of the DAME Design Awards have spoken, and the winner of the marine electronics category is Navman’s G-Pilot 3380. “This is an extremely cohesive product, with an attractive case design, intuitive controls and clear graphic displays on a 3.8in LCD colour screen that include animations, help prompts and a user-friendly compass page.”  I’ve raved about this interface before and am pleased to note that it is now also available on the new Northstar 3300 autopilot, with a casing “system matched” to  Northstar’s 6000i displays. The two sister companies are a little shy about this duplication, because otherwise their products are quite distinct, but, heck, why not? (Note that I have not tryed the Navman/Northstar pilot on the water, and doubt the judges did either. And even if we had, pilots can perform fine on one boat but not another. All of which is why it’s so hard to introduce a new autopilot.)

The winner of the Marine related software category is Navionics Platinum, which makes sense to me, and relevant Special Mentions include Airmar’s WeatherStation, Simrad’s SART, and something called Octoplex from Moritz Aerospace.  I haven’t mentioned the latter yet, but got a good introduction at Lauderdale and agree with the Dame guys about its specialness. More to come.

Garmin 2006 new marine products, a slew

The Garmin media team was busy last night, distributing a stack of complicated press releases and a pile o’ product shots, all to describe some 20 new units that were introduced at METS today (and will go on sale next March). Here are the bullet points I’ve gathered so far:

* New BlueChart G2 (next generation) charts feature 3D perspective, tides and currents overlay, and other enhancements, and a slew of new plotters, plotter/fishfinders, and network multifunction displays (like the 3206 above, bigger here) come preloaded with all U.S. coastal G2’s. (NOAA’s freebie policy strikes again!)

* But G2 is a two tier product, sort of like what Navionics is up to, and G2 chart cards add more data like detailed coastal roads, more POIs, and color aerial photos of critical areas. Garmin says that U.S. cards will start at $199, “far less than competitors”. (But I don’t know what that means exactly). G2, by the way, is not compatible with older plotters, except the 3000 series, but older BlueCharts will work in new plotters.

* Garmin has a new network called CANet, which can connect the smaller 292, 392, and 492 plotters with two new black box fishfinders or the new 398 full fishfinder. It sounds like a CANbus variant but is 1 megabit (?). The GSD-22 bb is Garmin’s “first digital sonar, allowing for more precise target separation and depth performance” and also supports Garmin’s MarineNet (Ethernet).

It’s going to be interesting to see how all these products stack up. I’m wondering, for instance, what Garmin’s version of 3D perspective looks like, and whether G2 will also come on CD. And, of course, pesky observers like Panbo reader R.O. are asking “what about NMEA 2000”. More to come, to be sure.

PS It will also be interesting to see who picked up DAME awards at METS today; this is one of the better innovation competitions out there, I think. And, by the way, Jeff Hummel is at METS and says he’ll write a Panbo guest blog on his findings.

Garmin 376C, holy mackerel!

I would have posted earlier today, except that fooling with this Garmin 376C vividly reminded me (above, and bigger here) that the spell of dry, sunny weather was about to end. So I spent some hours winterizing the fleet, all the while watching the clouds thicken up from below and above. I could also see an animation of all that rain moving across New York state, plus the lightning strikes, the frontal lines, pressure gradients, wind predictions, buoy reports, etc. etc. It is phenomenal how well you can see all this info on the 376’s little screen. The display itself is exceptionally bright and detailed, and Garmin has also done a good job at letting you view the weather data mixed together or one element at a time. And, get this, I was also listening to XM radio (below). I’ve been trying the 376C intermittently over the last month or so, and am very, very impressed. It really makes sense in terms of carrying your XM weather and audio subscriptions with you on land or sea. The only con I can think of is that BlueCharts have gotten pretty expensive relative to the competition, but maybe that will change.

The Garmin 276C was one of my 5 Sail magazine “editor’s picks” for innovative, important marine electronics introduced last year. I’m working on my 2005 picks right now, and the 376C is definitely a contender. If you have suggestions for other hardware or software that should be on the list, please let me know.

Maptech + Rose Point = Chart Navigtor Pro!

Whoa, things are happening even faster than enthusiastic yours truly thought possible. For $500, Maptech’s new Chart Navigator Pro (CNP) give’s you 13 (13!) DVDs containing NOAA’s entire portfolio of U.S. RNCs and ENCs, plus all of Maptech’s accessory cartography—photo maps, harbor panoramas, topos, bathy maps, pilot books, and information databases. But the real surprise inside is that Maptech ditched its aging, non-quilting, non-vector charting software in favor of Coastal Explorer. The name has changed, but CNP is CE 1.1 with nothing taken out and Maptech’s decent 3D contour engine added. CNP gets introduced today at the Fort Lauderdal Boat Show and will supposedly be in stores next month.

PS, 11/7: Thanks to Greg’s comment for a head’s up that Maptech has launched a new site, freeboatingcharts.com, where you can download all the U.S. RNCs you want. I don’t quite understand why Maptech is doing this before NOAA has a system in place, but it works fine. First you select the charts you want, then the site packages them up in a self executing zip file and notifies you when it’s ready for download. It only took maybe a half hour for me to receive the 15 charts that cover my area in all scales.

Raymarine A65 & Navionics Silver, strategies

Next week in Ft. Lauderdale I’ll get an on-the-water demo of the new Raymarine A65 along with its included Navionics Silver chart card…so details then, apparent strategies now:

* The A65 is a 6.5”, though full VGA, plotter/fishfinder (or plain plotter) that seems to incorporate Raymarine’s crisp digital sonar technology and some of the friendly soft key interface seen in the C and E Series. It does not support radar, a high speed bus, or even SeaTalk2/NMEA 2000, but it does seem to offer some bigger boat electronics goodness in a smaller package (and price, though I don’t have the exact numbers just yet).

* The A65 comes with a Navionics Silver CF card that includes full detail coverage of the entire US coast. My understanding is that this signals the beginning of Navionics’ three tier chart strategy—Silver, Gold, Platinum…good, better, best. All the details aren’t out but the idea is that users of at least some machines can upgrade through the tiers as desired; meanwhile Navionics can move features down through the tiers as competition dictates. Slick.

The total package seems like a big “hello” to Garmin’s 192/198 series, Lowrance’s NauticPath etc., and also, in a way, to NOAA’s imminent giving away of all U.S. raster charts. (And a note to readers from outside the States: sorry that your governments are not pushing vendors to provide more and better chart coverage for less money, but then again you don’t have a powerful politician trying to gag your met offices.)

Nobeltec 2006, a peek at 8.0 versions

Last night Nobeltec announced the new features coming to VNS and Admiral 8.0 PC navigation software; they’ve been busy! Both packages integrate camera/video displays (for DirectX enabled cameras) and SkyMate communications, plus add a place-name search capability (all illustrated in my collage above, bigger here). Both also now support NOAA ENCs and will plot DSC VHF calls. AIS target tracking has expanded from Admiral to VNS and Nobeltec will be selling the single frequency NASA/Si-Tex AIS100 receiver [corrected 10/16]. Meanwhile, Admiral will now be able to support multiple radars and the InSight Sounder over a GlassBridge Network, resulting in such sexy system possibilities as the one diagrammed below. 

Lowrance iWay features, coming to boats?

The music screen above is from a Lowrance iWay automobile mapping system. It has a touchscreen and a 20 gig hard drive—partitioned so that 10 gigs are for onboard maps, 10 for tunes. PC Magazine made the iWay its Editor’s Choice in a May roundup review that included units from Garmin, Magellan, and Navman. I just came across it and was reminded of how Darrell Lowrance enthused about touch screens for multifunction marine displays during a press conference at the Miami Boat Show last winter. Lowrance’s best 2005 plotter/fishfinders are already similar to the iWay series in many aspects, like the hard drive; will they get touchscreens and MP3 players next year? There’s a ferocious competition going on to be a dominant player in the car plotter market, which has got to explode at some point. What are the manufacturers learning and developing that might migrate to boats?

I hesitate to report RUMORS, but given that strong caveat, these seem worth a “head’s up”: supposedly Lowrance’s NMEA 2000 GPS sensors have trouble with radar transmissions, and supposedly its NauticPath marine charts don’t properly show obstructions that are awash between high and low tide. Mind you, these are only rumors and, even if true, may have been fixed already or are about to be.

SeaRef, a nice product found weirdly

I learned about SeaRef the hard way, when its developer Dan Podell tried to advertise it by posting messages on the PMY forums. That’s a no-no there, and here too, but I did contact Dan to tell him that I’d be happy to have a look at his CD full of nautical info. I’m doing that right now, and am impressed. SeaRef is a well organized compendium of useful calculators, tables, and publications. The example above is a page from a hyperlinked .pdf version of the BC Sailing Directions. You can learn more about the CD’s contents, or buy it, at Podell’s eBay site.

You may realize that most, maybe all, of SeaRef’s contents can be downloaded for free from various web sites, but I’d say that Podell is charging a very reasonable fee for finding it all and organizing it with .html pages. You may also realize that the SetSail.com Navigator’s Library is a similar product. I tried an earlier edition of that product and note that it now comes on 2 CD’s and contains a number of items missing from SeaRef, like the complete Bowditch, the CIA World Factbook, and numerous Sailing Directions for areas outside North America. On the other hand, it’s more expensive and at least the edition I tried had a fairly obnoxious copy protection scheme. SeaRef is unprotected and has items NL doesn’t, like a Medical Handbook (oriented to ships, like much of this material, though still useful), flags of the world, and much more.

PS If you have a marine electronics/navigation product you want me to know about or try, please just e-mail me (ben.ellison@panbo.com).

Compass deviation, who's responsible?

The compass adjustment trip that I missed the other day was aboard a nearly brand new, high quality 30’ power boat. But the steering compass, a decent Ritchie SS1000, turned out to be 45° off on some headings and “limp” if you were pointed north! Jeff Kaufmann tells me that this is just an extreme example of a common situation. Boatbuilders may install the compass but don’t pay attention to the deviation, leaving that for whoever installs all the electronics, who may not pay attention either. Jeff says his fee is sometimes paid by a yacht broker trying to complete a deal, because no one else will take responsibility.

At any rate, Jeff took this boat out into Penobscot Bay and used a GPS bearing to a fixed and charted object to get one solid bearing. With that reference he could then use his directional gyro (lower left in the Bloomquist photo above, home built from old military parts) to check the compass on multiple headings. Then he used that little magnetometer in his hand to look for the culprits. The main problem turned out to be a large steel hydraulic steering control mounted almost directly under the compass (the yacht in the picture is not the same boat, by the way).

Using well developed intuition plus trial and error, he figured out where to position an external magnet to negate the offending one. That took a big bite out the worst deviations, plus made the compass lively again on North headings. Then he used the SS1000’s small built-in correction magnets to get the deviation nearly to zero on all headings. Finally, he checked for possible transient problems and found one in the windshield wiper motor, which he couldn’t fix, of course, but did note on the deviation card. Jeff has come across a lot of odd compass problems over the years; I think at this point he can look around a boat and visualize 3D magnetic fields emanating from wiper motors, power cables, buzzers, hunks of steel, CRT tubes, etc. etc.

Ritchie, incidentally, has a good guide to compass basics that they will send you for free or let you download as a .pdf.

Navionics road trip, & Panbo irregularity

I’m back from Boston, where Navionics showed a bunch of boating writers what Platinum cartography looks like on the water, and also laid out its overall product plan for 2006. Panbo-wise, it’s all a little frustrating. I’ve been beta testing Platinum on a Raymarine E-120 all summer, and have tons of photos and screen shots to illustrate its features in detail. However, I agreed to Raymarine’s understandable request that I not use anything until the code is finalized. Soon, I’m told, very soon. (I got the shot above, and bigger here, during the demo; on the left screen you can see how big the oblique marina and port entrance photos are. Incidentally, when there was a chart on that screen, it was neat to see how well it could synchronize with the 3D screen at right, something I hadn’t seen in my testing).

Similarly, I can’t yet talk about what Navionics is up to in 2006 (very interesting). Instant Panbo publishing is a little too fast for these guys! I may run into this situation a lot this fall, as electronics companies reveal their new products, often timed to magazine cycles two or more months long. Plus my Panbo posting schedule is going to be choppy. In the next six weeks I’ve got a ‘research’ cruise with my daughter on the Hudson river, a press junket to the French Riviera, two trips to Florida (NMEA conference and Ft. Lauderdale boat show), and a completely non nautical but spectacular conference (Pop!Tech) where I volunteer so I can hear what some really large brains are thinking about our tech future. I think of this fall period as a regime of fattening my own brain for the winter ahead.

Swingship, and getting a compass right

 

Nova Marine recently brought out a compass deviation and correction program called Swingship. Even the free download version could help you at least document just how out of whack, or accurate, your steering compass really is. If you care. It’s interesting how differently even very experienced boaters think on this subject. “The magnetic compass is the primary navigation instrument on any vessel,” writes the developer of Swingship, who I’ve heard is a solo trans ocean sailor. But the salty gent who took me out on his big Eastbay doesn’t much care that his beautifully mounted compass is off. Jeff Kauffman—a compass adjuster for 17 years, a serious delivery skipper even longer—told me this morning, “It’s a bitter pill for guys like me, but there is no question that the magnetic compass has become the secondary heading device on most boats.” I didn’t get to tag along with Jeff on that adjustment job last week, but today I got an interesting blow by blow description. I’ll write up the story soon. In the meantime, I’m deep into compass study. Sorry to report that while the online version of Bowditch (American Practical Navigator) still has a useful chapter on compass technology, gone is the detailed one on compass error that I see in my 1984 print edition. Also took another look at Alan Gurney’s Compass, a history I read last spring. What a fine book.

The magnetic compass, yay or nay?

At right is a aft-looking view of the Eastbay helm I visited last week. You can see some serious wood work that puts the steering compass right where you’d want it. The problem is that this compass performs poorly; apparently its deviation error varies with the status of various electronics and is therefore not correctable. I hear this story all the time. And the second part of the story is like most: the owner doesn’t much care, as he’s content with the COG and heading readings he gets from his GPS and the electronic compass in his autopilot. In fact, of the 4 new J-100s launched in my harbor this summer (there’s a sailboat model on fire!), only one has a magnetic compass (but all have 12” multifunction displays!). That really surprised me as sailors tend to be the most compass obsessed of boaters. What’s going on? Is the traditional compass going the way of the paper chart? Is there one on your boat? Is it adjusted properly? Do you use it? I’d appreciate your thoughts.

It happened that a very experienced compass adjuster I know stopped by yesterday. He told me that the compass above is a poor quality Danforth, and that a similarly sized Ritchie SS-2000 would likely do a better job. I’m hoping to tag along with Jeff on an adjustment job, and learn more about how to make a magnetic compass work well around a modern helm full of electro-magnetic forces.

By the way, the odd little frame next to the compass above is a serial port so that routes and waypoints can be uploaded into the Northstar 6000i’s via NMEA 0183.

Cruising on the high end, w/ Northstar

Sorry if there’ve been too many “what’s on board” entries recently, but these are the high days of summer here, they don’t last long, and I’m enjoying them! Yesterday I took a little spin on this spiffy Eastbay 54SX; the ‘research’ will go into my next Helm Shot column in Voyaging. I’m particularly pleased with this picture (bigger here); I had to do a lot of fiddling to make it look like reality! (By the way, those are the Camden Hills out there; I live in the westward lee of the middle one).

Yes, there are FOUR Northstar 6000i’s on this single helm boat, but the very experienced owner—this may be his 13th sizable boat, he’s lost count—has his reasons. The two 10” displays on the Himalaya (that’s what they call that little mountain of an electronics cabinet you see on these tall windowed boats) are the main navigation tools, usually run chart left, radar right. (North up and head up, respectively…the man has been doing this a long time, and says he’s sticking with the modes he knows). They’re networked together with Northstar’s N2 (Ethernet), sharing a 4’ 12kw (special order) radar scanner, a GPS, and a black box fishfinder. The two smaller overhead displays share their own N2 network, another GPS, and a 4kw dome scanner. Redundancy! The system is also designed so that guests, or a co-pilot, can use that 6” display at far left without getting in the skipper’s way. Meanwhile the right 8” is ready to serve as backup if the main system packs up. (It’s also set to use radar overlay, which the owner admits to ‘peeking’ at on occasion ;-). There’s more of interest on this boat, but for later…

Onboard PC, what's the ideal?

 

Over at rec.boats.electronics there’s a great thread underway about the ‘perfect’ built-in onboard computer. I’m particularly interested as I’ll likely go that route if and when I ever manage to finagle a larger cruising boat. In the meantime, last week I put some miles on the rather funky rig above (bigger here), and it actually performed pretty darn well, even gunkholing around the hairy unmarked ledges in Penobscot Bay’s outer waters (it was calm and clear). I used the old soft case (and sometimes a towel) to keep the laptop from sliding around. Valuable accessories are the Hoodman screen hood (really cuts glare, though I notice they don't seem to sell this model anymore), a tiny Atek optical USB mouse, and an old Deluo USB GPS (no WAAS and weak signals in my cabin, but still consistently accurate). Here I’m using Coastal Explorer 1.1 (now shipping), which is giving me that “the more I use it, the more I like it” feeling. It happens that the designer of CE has an interesting description of his own onboard PC system here.

Photographing LCD screens, a challenge

My PMY column about testing NMEA 2000 is in print and online now, but something odd happened during the production process. It opens with a picture of the NMEA test setup aboard my little outboard boat, Gizmo. The screen on the laptop is naturally quite blown out in the open sunlight, so the PMY page designer asked the “color house” to goose it up a bit. Actually, this is often necessary to make photographs of LCD screens look more realistic, since a camera is nowhere near as agile as the human eye. But someone in the color house took a shortcut and simply copied the Raymarine E screen onto to the laptop, creating a very unrealistic image. Nobody noticed until it was printed.

At any rate, above is another image of the two NMEA 2000 plotters, plus a Standard Horizon CP1000, aboard my other test boat. It’s unretouched, meaning all the screens actually seemed brighter in reality, but it does show (bigger here) how comparatively bright the Raymarine E is (though note that the screens are not in direct sunlight, so transflective properties are not evident). If there was a laptop in the scene, it would look darn dim. (A March article I wrote about the E series is also now online, though without pictures.)

Test boat #2, by the way, is the long neglected Ralph, which deserves an entry one day. But today the missus and I are headed off for a long weekend of cruising aboard, so there will be no entry tomorrow unless I come across an odd WiFi connection in the outer islands.

JRC Doppler Sonar, such technology

How do they do that? The new JRC JLN-550 Speed Log at right is displaying not just 18k of forward speed over the ground (SOG),  but is also showing that the bow is going to starboard at 1.8k and the stern to port at the same speed. The trick starts with a 4 beam 240 khz sonar transducer in the bow. The doppler shifting of the sonar pings off the bottom is used to get two axis SOG. The third axis (the stern motion) is calculated by adding rate-of-turn input from a gyro or ROT capable electronic compass. When bottom depths exceed 250 meters, the unit can switch to speed through the water (STW) using ultrasonics (2 mhz) to measure passing particles. Now this is big ship gear for sure—it starts at about $26,000, and the 265 pound transducer is termed “compact”—but accurate STW underway and multi axis SOG around docks would be very useful on medium size boats too. I’m hopeful. Airmar already has an ultrasonic speed transducer scaled for yachts (pdf brochure here). Now we just need a small, reasonably priced 4 beam sonar transducer.

Richard Stephens, master mini navigator

I’m a long time fan of the PDA charting program Memory Map, which is also sold as Maptech Pocket Navigator, and think that its developer, Richard Stephens, is one hell of a programmer. It’s no great surprise then that Richard has mastered mini PC navigation, even while overnight racing aboard a wickedly wet Corsair 28R trimaran (In fact, it was so wet, at one point we had a 2’ long fish flapping around in the cockpit!). But it’s good to know that a coder is out there getting his butt soggy (getting to be one of my favorite blogs), and it surely is interesting to hear about his set up:

I used a PDA for navigation (of course). It was connected by Bluetooth to a GPS and to a cell phone in the cabin, which was in turn connected to a Digital Antenna signal booster and 4' antenna. The PDA was an iPaq 4700, in a Otterbox 1900 hard case. I wear the PDA most of the time, strapped to my body with bungee cord (under my PFD belt so it does not flap around). It is turned off when I am not actively navigating, to save power. I also wear a Garmin Foretrex on my wrist, programmed with the route and strategic waypoints [using Memory Map either on the PDA or a PC].

The PDA runs Memory-Map for navigation, using the full detail of NOAA raster charts, with all weekly NTM corrections applied. I used the cellular internet connection to access weather information from NOAA. The real-time buoy/weather station reports, weather radar images, and the ETA wind model.  were all extremely useful at different stages of the race. All of these were accessed just using the web browser on the PDA.

Richard and the rest of the Flight Simulator team won first in class in their latest race, the Mackinac. How geek cool is that?

Garmin 376C, a lot in a little

I tested a Garmin 276C last year, and it’s an excellent little chart plotter, and also quite adept at street navigation (screen selection, distance and speed units, and routing style all switch over with a single button push). The screen is very bright and very fast. In fact, it was one of my five “editor’s picks” for 2004 in Sail magazine. Now the 376C adds XM weather and audio, making this unit far and away the most unique portable on the market. You can even plug in a blackbox fishfinder. I also tried an early version of Garmin’s Network system, which included XM weather and radio. The interface to all this info was a little clunky, but I understand that it’s been vastly improved. Which I imagine we’ll see in the 376C. And the network's fairly large receiver and separate antenna have been reduced to the petite GXM 30 smart antenna shown above. The 376C retails for a grand, but you really could carry it, along with your subscriptions to XM weather and radio, from boat to car to home. Neato! (But do note that it does not include all U.S. charts, like the new 192C). Here's a higher res version of the image at top, showing some of XM weather’s rich data. Note the storm cell predictions and lightning tracking (which is 5 minutes fresh and extends 300 miles off the U.S. coast). And here’s a column I wrote about the Garmin phenomenon last year.

Raymarine E & Navionics Platinum, ALMOST here

There’s finally some good Web material up about Navionics Platinum charts. Not surprisingly it’s at Raymarine’s site, as the E Series will be the first to display it. Definitely check out the “Feature Tour”, whose Flash animation illustrates some of Platinum’s dynamic nature. Raymarine calls this all a “Preview”, with the actual chart cards and E Series software upgrade “Coming Soon”. My sense is that it will be quite soon, as I’m starting to see ads too. Plus I’ve been trying out beta versions for a while now, and the software seems darn solid to me. Raymarine understandably asked me not to comment on beta product, but hopefully that too will change soon. In the meantime, one word: outstanding!

Safe Pass plotting, why not?

Fred Pot showed me a really interesting new concept in target plotting that was developed at a Dutch maritime school. Currently many plotters/PCs and radars can automatically use ARPA and/or AIS info to calculate the CPA (Closest Point of Approach) and TCPA (Time of CPA) for vessels within range. Typically they flash a warning if a potential CPA drops below a preset threshold like 1 mile, meaning that you and the other vessel are going to pass that close if you both maintain current course and speed. This is all good—and beats the hell out of manual plotting—but still leaves the operator to figure out how to change course/speed to avoid tight CPAs, which can get especially complicated when there are multiple vessels involved. “Safe Pass” works a little like computerized weather routing, calculating various CPA/TCPA data versus possible changes in your course and then plotting potential safe, and dangerous, areas ahead. In the example above, bigger here, you are about to cross a shipping lane with two vessels crossing each way. Turning left will make things worse, but turning right between the red “danger clouds” will result in a safe passage (assuming the other vessels maintain course and speed). The concept seems to make a lot of sense, and has purportedly tested well in ship simulators (at that Dutch school), but so far no developer is yet working to make it available. I wonder why not?

LookSea, a look at the future?

Never mind that Yme covered this Friday’s (mega) gizmo early last year. LookSea  is truly unique, little known, and, besides, it was developed right here in the great state of Maine. What you’re seeing—larger image here—are a fenced route and buoy icons precisely superimposed on the video flowing from a pan and tilt, high resolution, wide angle camera mounted on the cabin top. ARPA and AIS targets, charted obstructions, and whatever else you need (and only what you need) can also be geopositioned on the live video. This is damn tricky to pull off accurately, and if it wasn’t done really fast, it would literally make you sick. I saw it demoed in a bouncy little boat on a snotty night, and can tell you that it works beautifully (fat .pdf of my article available here). I second the claim that LookSea is the “only augmented reality marine navigational system available and represents a quantum leap in safety and situational awareness.” It’s darn expensive, but I figure it’s a harbinger of things to come. (LookSea now a good step-by-step demo and other materials here).

i3 type 3, eye-yi-yi!

A bonus of my trip to Annapolis was getting to try Maptech’s third generation i3. I first saw this system back in 2001, when it was being developed as the Sea Ray Navigator (and it’s still going on many new Sea Rays under that name, despite parent Brunswick’s own move into electronics). Last summer I enjoyed a live demo of the second generation system, which Maptech had begun to market on its own as i3. By then the developers had added radar plus optional touch screen versions of Weather Channel Marine and SkyMate. Now Maptech owns the contractor that actually builds the i3 hardware, and the new Type 3 is a significant upgrade. The screen is more stylish, more colorful, and brighter, and the software flys. Plus there are many interface improvements (besides the 3D fishfinder option). In the screen above (bigger here), notice how the radar range rings can be shown on the 3D screen to make better sense of relative scales. Notice too how the 3D is automatically exaggerated to make the good, and bad, sections of this relatively shallow river (hey, I live in Maine) obvious. Look at how well the radar is synched to the chart, despite the fact that there is no electronic compass in this particular install and we’re doing 26 knots (which is why the depth sounder isn’t reading; the transducer needed better fairing for high speed). It’s not shown but Type 3 also lets you remove the side menus, or make critical info semi transparent, so you get more chart on the 12” screen. And, finally, there’s now a 15” screen version too. i3/SRN is not just a unique concept; it’s an evolving family of functions.

Garmin 192C, for real

I was out testing in bright sunshine Saturday morning, and the screen on the Garmin 192C stood up very well. In fact this is the worst image I got, and it’s still quite readable (bigger here…note the glare, reflected elbow, and gunk on screen—real world factors you’ll rarely see in ads or articles). The 192 is the new unit that comes with all U.S. coastal charts in memory and ready to use. They really are all there, along with large area charts of places like the Bahamas, a good world map, and tons of port information. It is true that you can not use these charts with Garmin’s MapSource to do planning on a PC, but the no-PC-needed simplicity will be a plus for many users; even updating the charts will be done with a card. The only other con I could detect is that the find function is slowed down somewhat by the massive amount of data it has to search through. Besides the brighter, more color saturated screen, I noticed numerous subtle improvements in Garmin’s already effective tabbed interface. I’d guess the 192 will appeal to smaller boat owners wanting ready-to-use simplicity and flexibility (trailer north or south for vacation, get a card for lakes), not to mention cruisers who do big sections of the U.S. coast and want a backup to integrated and/or PC systems. The 192 comes with internal or external GPSs, and there’s a 198 version with fishfinder. Garmin won’t say if it might bring the all-US-charts-onboard strategy to other models, but what do you think? (Especially as Lowrance is offering this feature on many units).

Simrad DVD, almost a free lunch

 

This weekend’s mail included Simrad’s “Navigation Tutorial” DVD, which is pretty darn impressive. Of course there is some ‘sell’ to it, but there’s also some sharp footage of boats and extensive, well done explanations of just how Simrad’s multifunction Navigators work. (That’s the narrator’s hand in the picture, not mine, explaining dual radar ranges). This DVD is excellent for anyone who owns a Simrad, or is interested in one, and it’s absolutely free, including shipping. The order form is on the Simrad USA home page.

 

NSI, under the radar

The croakers and rockfish just weren’t biting, but the research trip was terrific anyway. I’ll have more to say later about trying the latest incarnation of Maptech i3 and the Airmar factory tour, both very impressive, but today’s entry is about a little company you’ve never heard of called NSI (Nautical Solutions International). Google can’t find them but principals Mark Pringle and Floyd Phillips have been doing valuable, innovative (behind the scenes) work with 3D bathymetry since 1996. You may have seen it as contour modules in Maptech or Raymarine software, or as Bass Tracker on ESPN (and there’s more to come).  Their web site is informative, but doesn’t show you how their office is right next to the marina where they keep two test boats ready to run year round. The latest, the Defiance 260 above, is totally tricked out with i3 gear; besides the big scanner, those are Weather Channel Marine and SkyMate satellite antennas up there. Such a deal: Maptech sponsors a great boat for showing off i3, which the lads at NSI also use to tweak the 3D fishfinder (and take a break from coding). Nice!

NDI, chart pirates?

I have no tolerance for boaters who rip off electronic charts; the practice hurts decent companies and has understandably led to copy protection schemes the rest of us have to cope with. But one chart manufacturer, Nautical Data International (NDI), has earned its own reputation for pirate practices. It ticked off customers for years with extra high prices, flawed encryption code, and even a “time out” mechanism that rendered charts you owned useless after a certain period. Two years ago, a nasty royalty fight erupted between NDI and the two big chart card companies C-Map and Navionics. You see, in 1993 NDI somehow wrangled not only the exclusive right to market electronic versions of Canadian Hydrographic Office (CHS) charts, but also exclusive right to negotiate royalty arrangements with other vendors. Many lawsuits followed, some still in court, but last winter CHS announced that it would terminate its relationship to NDI. Hence the strange  press releases featured on NDI’s home page (right) proclaiming its ability to continue “business as usual” and its success suing the government office it’s dependent on. I bring this up because I recently helped a friend prepare for a Newfoundland cruise and can confirm that charts he bought from NDI five years ago will not run or reinstall on his PC. He will use paper charts rather than ever do business with NDI again.

Navionics' Platinum, photo maps

I’ve been getting requests to show more Platinum screens, so here’s one of what’s called Aerial Overlay. That means you can blend the regular vector charts with photo maps, which are straight down images that have been geopositioned so data (including your boat) can be plotted on them. Here the transparency of the photo map is set at 69% using the rotary knob on an Raymarine E120. Note how the photos improve your knowledge of what’s along the shore. Note too that the blending  reveals descrepencies between the vector data and the photo map, a head’s up that one or the other is inaccurate. Platinum seems to include this resolution of photo maps for the whole U.S.; I understand the European version is lower res. Note too the camera icon, which shows you that there is also an “oblique” or “panoramic” photo available for this specific spot (wish we could all agree on nomenclature!). These are not geopositioned but do give you a useful perspective view of important inlets, marinas, etc. In Platinum they are quite high res (example coming).

 

Si-Tex eLoran, belt & suspenders GPS

I like this: GPS backed up—plus made more accurate, even able to deliver better than 1° heading accuracy at rest—with LORAN! And this is LORAN without the fiddly complexity of compensating for “Additional Secondary Factors” in coastal waters or switching ‘Chains’ on long voyages. Si-Tex’s eLoran is not quite shipping yet, but I’ll bet it will get loads of attention (Chuck Husick already has this to say). In fact, we’ve all gotten so dependent on GPS that it’s a little scary. I wrote about its vulnerability, and the possible resurgence of LORAN as a complimentary system back in 2002, and have since noted the government’s funding of LORAN base station improvements. It’s great to see belt & suspenders electronic positioning come to recreational boating, not to mention the non magnetic heading sensor capability. Actually, eLoran is one result of a military research contract executed by Si-Tex’s mother company, Koden. Note that this initial product will only work with certain Si-Tex plotters and PC software at first, but other manufacturers will be free to add compatability. I’ve also been told that eLoran will cost about $1,000, and I plan to try one out when available.

Navionics' Platinum, first peek

I have an article about Navionics’ and C-Map’s new plotter charts in the June issues of both PMY and Sail, but unfortunately neither is online yet. C-Map Max is shipping and there are good images of it here, but Platinum—which by design, and pricing, is the more ambitious product—is still a mystery to most anyone who didn’t get a chance to see it previewed at the Miami Boat Show. Above is a screenshot of 3D mode, which really should be a video to do it justice. You can see (bigger here) that critical chart data like buoys and wrecks are overlaid on a composite of land photo maps and underwater bathymetry. The soft keys on the Raymarine E120, which will soon be the first plotter to display Platinum, indicate how you can adjust the pitch and rotation of your view. There’s much more. One indication of how much more is the fact that Platinum comes on 2 Gig Compact Flash cards!

Navman AP338, excellent interface

Every year I get to pick five especially innovative and/or well executed electronics products for Sail magazine’s February “Editor Picks” section. Right now a top contender is Navman’s AP338 autopilot, not for performance (it’s darn hard to test autopilots) but because its interface is amazing. Almost any pilot can “dodge” an obstacle, usually 10 degrees per button push, but this one actually shows you what the commands are doing to your heading and what you can do next. There’s much more to this interface but I’m working with a flaky WiFi connection this morning, and busy, so for now I’m just going to link you to my writeup in June PMY.

Nobeltec Sounder, package completed?

Nobeltec just announced an InSight Sounder option for its VNS and Admiral charting+++ programs. The company can now supply the soft– and hardware for plotting, radar, AIS, and fishfinding, including a heading sensor and even a wireless display. Nobeltec has also established a relationship with SkyMate, the easy-to-use satellite messaging and monitoring system that I’ve followed with much interest. Their respective programs can now share a PC and sensors nicely, and maybe more (not much on either company’s sites yet). Finally, Nobeltec has slashed the price of its AIS listener (was it the first to offer AIS to yachts?), and is running some new rebate programs. And we can imagine that the lads in the lab are working on more ways to expand the total package.

Furuno NavNet MaxSea, a big deal

The June issue of PMY includes my take on the Furuno/MaxSea alliance. I titled it “Keys to the Kingdom” because it’s truly a big deal for Furuno to give PC software access to its whole NavNet system. It really shows what Ethernet can do, besides string multifunction displays together, and I’m guessing it will “encourage” Garmin, Northstar, and Raymarine to develop or find PC programs to run with their Ethernet systems. Dedicated electronics and PC-based systems used to be parallel universes (with a few significant exceptions); now they’re coming together. Good!

Be a chart skeptic

U.S. Navy Submarine Captain Kevin Mooney takes full responsibility for crashing the San Francisco into a practically uncharted undersea mount in the Pacific last January. Yesterday the New York Times published a detailed story about the