Ray marine Analog W/S/D integration

[AwwShucks]

First off - new to the forum - this is a great resource that I wish I had found when I purchased my boat last spring.

Question for the community about integrating the legacy Raymarine Wind, Speed and Depth sensors from the 2002 outfitting of the boat into B&G chartplotter. (Undecided between Vulcan and Zeus). I have the listing of components and interfaces that I will need (Raymarine Itc5) but wanted to see if anyone had done something similar and not had major issues with data transmission. Also, thinking of ditching the independent W/S/D gauges and going with a Triton on helm as a backup readout display. Do I really the need the redundancy or am I falling for some up selling? Primarily will be day / weekend sailing around the Chesapeake. Thanks.

 

[leo310]

I went with Garmin and replacing Raymarine depth and using it as a forward scan hooked EV-100 AP using 2K with no problems. You should be ok with B&G using 2K will need sea talk converter to 2K for older sea talk units.

 

[jssailem]

@AwwShucks If you are planning to not use raymarine products you may be best advised to remove the Raymarine products and replace with the new system. While it is possible to intermix product it often becomes more of a pain then a reliable system. Sell the raymarine products on eBay to lessen the cost.

I have the iTC-5 unit. It is converting analog signals into seatalk ng. So far it is working well to provide depth from an old school transducer to my P70 control unit display for the EV100 autopilot.

And Welcome to the best group of sailors on the internet.

 

[Bill Roosa]

as long as your plotter will accept NMEA 2000 data your only issue should be getting a Ray to B&G cable to connect the two. There are only 4 wires and the color codes are pretty standard so neutering two cables and making one with a splice will work. Don't forget to include the shield foil in the splice.

 

[Jackdaw]

After years of ignoring the issue, Raymaine finally offers decent integration solutions for its non-NMEA2K devices. The aforementioned iTC-5 works well, I used it it integrate a legacy ST60 wind/depth/speed setup into a Simrad-dominated NMEA2K network on Kestrel. Pretty flawless at 100 bucks.

And now the Micro-talk wireless gateway bridges into the the TackTick Micronet wireless devices, for less than $250.

 

[LeslieTroyer]

My main caution on mixing NMEA 2K (including variants like SeatalkNG) is the ability to calibrate and update firmware is NOT part of the N2K standard and each vendor can have requirements for additional hardware to calibrate/update firmware. I believe John can calibrate his ITC5 with the P70 but cannot update the firmware (in either ITC5 or P70 or autopilot).

Les

 

[AwwShucks]

I got a full schematic from the Tech Guru at the Annapolis West Marine. He had a drawing from another customer and we just filled it in with items that I would need to purchase. It appears to be relatively straightforward, aside from cutting into breakers.

@Jackdaw did you keep the legacy ST60 equipment for redundancy factor?

Thanks for all the feedback that the setup works for others.

 

[Jackdaw]

@Jackdaw did you keep the legacy ST60 equipment for redundancy factor?

It was all still working fine and replacing it would have cost $1500. So it will stay on the boat until it fails. Until then it is sharing all the wind and boatspeed info with the plotters.

 

[marchem]

I stayed with Raymarine and got their e7D MFD. I did have to add an E22158 ST1 to STng converter, but it all went together very easily and only cost $100 more. I kept the ST60 displays and added a second pod to the helm station for the e7D. I also bought a Standard Horizon GX2200 to replace the original Raymarine VHF and send the GPS and AIS info from it to the e7D.

The Sydney 38 I race on has a B&G Vulcan. Having used both I actually prefer the e7D. The B&G has very sophisticated software with detailed corrections; but it requires accurate calibrations and is of little use to most cruisers, I think.

 

[AwwShucks]

Thanks much Marchem. That sounds like a much better plan.