Attn Raymarine Raystar 125 GPS owners

[artboas]

So, we started our cruise about 10 days ago with an overnight sail to the 1000 islands. Navigating into the islands from Lake Ontario can be very tricky, and many people have found out the hard way where the shoals are. To do this at night, an accurate Gps is essential.
At about 2AM, the GPS reported "position lost", and when went into the gps status screen on my E-Wide chart plotters, it found no signal from any satellites.
I rebooted the plotters, and after about 5 minutes I got a gps fix (whew!)
And then it crashed again
Pitch black, 2:30 AM, getting close to some very tricky areas. Needless to say, I was a little concerned.
On the top of the Raystar antenna is a tricolour led which flashes green when it's happy. Mine was flashing red. So, I knew it had power, and it was doing something quasi-intelligent.
I suspected that perhaps water had gotten in, but not sure how that could have happened.
So, with nothing to lose, I removed it from my stern rail, and took it down to the chart table for examination.
The unit is easy to open up with a couple of small Phillips screws.
As soon as I cracked it open, the problem was immediately obvious.
Inside is a 3 volt lithium battery, which is certainly used for storing hot fix data, etc. It was dead as a corpse.
The battery is a 2032 coin cell, which i very luckily had 2 spares aboard for a headlamp flashlight.
Replaced the battery, and 15 minutes later we had our GPS back.
If you own a Raystar 125, make sure you have at least one spare battery. Actually, you should probably just spend 20 minutes and $2 to replace it before you are really counting on your GPS, (like at 2 AM), and it dies on you.
Make sure that when you re-assemble it to put a bit of grease on the O ring which seals the unit from seawater

 

[BigEasy]

AR
A few months ago, I was surprised to learn that the ray star had a battery, at all, since it receives 12vpower from the plotter connection. After further research, It was my understanding that the internal battery is to maintain Ray star data upon shutdown of the 12v power source when the plotter is powered off. When the plotter is turned on again, the last data / fix is readily available from the ray Star until it can aquire updated satellite generated fixes. Works sort of like a computer battery to maintain clock time when the computer is shut down. It would seem that the ray star would not require internal battery power to aquire & maintain satellite acquisition when the system has 12v power. Sure there isn't a problem with the 12v supply that was causing loss of position, especially if the ray star internal battery was exhausted? Also can you describe the age of the internal battery? I have not seen any info regarding recommended replacement intervals for the internal battery.

 

[Don Lucas]

I actually still have a Raystar 120, but it is getting more and more unreliable (but that started 4 years ago and it has continued working). while the battery issue has been discussed in many threads it has also been discussed that probably the best solution is to get a Digital Yacht GPS150 DualNav Sensor that you can connect into the NEMA input of the Raymarine system. I finally have ordered one for $169.99, which was a lot better than the Raymarine GPS that was like $369 plus a STng to ST connection.

 

[artboas]

AR
A few months ago, I was surprised to learn that the ray star had a battery, at all, since it receives 12vpower from the plotter connection. After further research, It was my understanding that the internal battery is to maintain Ray star data upon shutdown of the 12v power source when the plotter is powered off. When the plotter is turned on again, the last data / fix is readily available from the ray Star until it can aquire updated satellite generated fixes. Works sort of like a computer battery to maintain clock time when the computer is shut down. It would seem that the ray star would not require internal battery power to aquire & maintain satellite acquisition when the system has 12v power. Sure there isn't a problem with the 12v supply that was causing loss of position, especially if the ray star internal battery was exhausted? Also can you describe the age of the internal battery? I have not seen any info regarding recommended replacement intervals for the internal battery.

I agree with your supposition that a dead battery should not make the basic functionality of the GPS degrade.
But it did. And it was 2 AM.
And at 3 AM with a new battery i was breathing a lot easier.

 

[LeoLambert310]

If you think about it Raymarine feels that after 5 years (battery life) you need to buy a new system for $$$$$ rather than $3 for a battery that they failed to note in the manual.

 

[BigEasy]

AR
Glad that the new battery fixed your immediate problem. Still concerned that your raystar is operating on the internal battery instead of the external 12 volt house bank like it is supposed to. Just saying that I would check it out further before it puts you in bad position again

 

[BigEasy]

Leo,
Isn't that the truth! Seems that RayM could have noted in the manual that the raystar had an internal battery. I read the manual in entirety when I installed the unit and can state with certainty that there was no mention of the internal battery. Found out about it by reading an online post a few months back. Sure would be nice to know this fact instead of finding out at 2:00AM in the morning in a stressful position that Art found himself in. You are correct in saying that the electronics has a 5 year window before its obsolete. My antenna is about 3 years old; ordered a battery & will replace it in a few weeks.

 

[Ron20324]

Okay, and what is the type number for the battery, please. Be nice to have a spare, or to go ahead and put it in.

 

[LeoLambert310]

Just pulled mine out, it's 2032,

 

[artboas]

AR
Glad that the new battery fixed your immediate problem. Still concerned that your raystar is operating on the internal battery instead of the external 12 volt house bank like it is supposed to. Just saying that I would check it out further before it puts you in bad position again

Definitely has proper power. It does run from the ST1 power.
While I agree that the data backup battery shouldn't cause the system to malfunction, it did. This was confirmed by the antenna not flashing green.
Definitely no mention in the manual about the battery.
There is no reason this antenna should be considered obsolete in 4 years. You don't change your vhf antenna. Yes, I know that the GPS has its own integrated receiver, but if it works, why change it?

 

[seadaddler]

I have had a few times where have lost fix but usually get it back.
I do always have backup like cell with navionics and Garmin hand held and tablet with
Navionics all for backup for any kind of a possible problem with my older C-80.
I know sounds over kill but started with the Garmin as backup that I also use Kayaking and just added the others over many years.
You never know when something goes wrong and stops working so at least one backup should be in hand.
Nick

 

[BigEasy]

Don't have any intention of replacing any of my electronics until absolutely necessary; however, I am going to replace the Raystar battery in the event that an exhausted battery prevents the antenna from acquiring satellites as happened to Art. It is frustrating that if one component fails and not replaceable, the entire integrated system including auto pilot, instruments, antenna, radar, & MFD are useless. If you can't find a replacement on EBay, you are out of luck. My ST60 instruments & wheel pilot 4000 are approaching 10 years.

 

[artboas]

Don't have any intention of replacing any of my electronics until absolutely necessary; however, I am going to replace the Raystar battery in the event that an exhausted battery prevents the antenna from acquiring satellites as happened to Art. It is frustrating that if one component fails and not replaceable, the entire integrated system including auto pilot, instruments, antenna, radar, & MFD are useless. If you can't find a replacement on EBay, you are out of luck. My ST60 instruments & wheel pilot 4000 are approaching 10 years.

Sorta funny you say this, re: "can't find a replacement on eBay"
Here has been my strategy for the last few boats I've owned:
Obviously I'd put on the latest & greatest gear when I first bought it.
And then, about 4 years later, the models of instruments that i bought would become obsolete. If you wait a bit past that time, dealers clear out their obsolete inventory, and it goes for cheap.
Time to "stock up"
I then purchase (at least) a full set of spares for my boat. Anything from instruments to Vhf.
And now if anything happens to my gear for the next five years, I just pull out a spare, and I'm done. Don't need to waste 3 weeks of Summer trying to get something repaired for a ton of money.
And when I finally sell my boat, guess what?
People will pay top dollar for obsolete gear new in boxes, as it costs a fortune to install new stuff, with the wiring & hole sizes being different. So, the stuff I bought for 1/2 price (or less) will be worth a lot more.
Essentially, at the end of the day, it costs me nothing to own this stuff, as I get it all back (plus more) when I move on to my next boat.
My basement looks like a West Marine store, but that's the privilege of owning a sailboat

 

[mz4wheeler]

I replaced the battery in my raystar a couple of years ago. It was also acting flaky, and being the ex-electronics technician that I am I took it apart to look for bad connections, and there was the battery. Replaced it, and it seemed to work fine ever since. The internals looked perfect otherwise. Good post!

 

[Ted]

I also have a Raymarine Raystar 125 GPS antenna. I'm not having problems with it but this post was a wake up call to check the battery anyway. The existing internal battery showed .6 volts on my multimeter. When new it's suppose to be 3 volts. Interesting that it was functioning properly with such a low voltage reading. Needless to say I replaced it with a fresh one. My previous GPS antenna was a Raystar 120. The battery on that unit was soldiered in and not something you could replace on the fly like the 125.

 

[Don Lucas]

Well I installed my new Digital Yacht GPS150 DualNav Sensor into my 15 year old Raymarine system replacing my old Raystar 120 (yes a 15 year old 120). other than dealing with running the wires and dealing the frekin tiny wire sizes it wasn't too bad. Works great and picks up more signals than the old system.

Just for those that need to replace it with something more reasonable than the answer RM gives.

 

[RHUMB RUNNER]

Mine is Deck mounted, how do you get it open?

 

[artboas]

Mine is Deck mounted, how do you get it open?

Simple
It is mounted to the deck with 2 screws from underneath.,
Undo these, and it will come off

 

[Screen Saver]

Hi just a word from down under. GPS loss if position I also to no expect it to be related to the battery. The battery is only used to speedup the initial fix time. With a dead battery provided, its not pulling the internal supply down the GPS will just take longer to get an initial fix from power up. My understanding is this applies to 90% of GPS's
As to position being lost I cant talk specifically on the R120,R125 or R130 all of which I have and use. Along with the soon to be released RS150.
What I can tell you from my experience on the R120 & R125, is yes I also lost position, and even worse got positions that were up to 20m-15nm !! out. The proof of this being in the track taking me in land at over 50mph to a mountain and back again, or you may have seen SOG's of double or more what you boat's real SOG is. Typical increased SOG is the first sign you will see of your GPS struggling. I have an SOG of over 60knots recorded.
What is interesting is having waypointed these lost positions and returned via the same route some weeks later, I lost position again in the same spots very often, these spots in my case may be 300nm from land. Thus my hunting for problems was a waste of time as the fault was not entirely the GPS's problem.
For those who have a GPS on there AIS. For some AIS's such as the AIS 500 it is possible to pass through that GPS's co-ordinates along with your primary GPS on your plotter. When I had R120 and R125 I did this and it worked extremely well I know longer had any outages, and still to this day I pass both these through. The only down side is if you are sailing on autopilot to waypoint (ie not a course) then on occasions if you pickup a position from your secondary GPS which will be different then your autopilot will work to correct this.
Hope this helps... My oldest GPS not Raymarine is 12 years, never replaced a batter, my oldest Raymaine GPS about 9 years also never replaced a battery.

 

[pateco]

Well I installed my new Digital Yacht GPS150 DualNav Sensor into my 15 year old Raymarine system replacing my old Raystar 120 (yes a 15 year old 120). other than dealing with running the wires and dealing the frekin tiny wire sizes it wasn't too bad. Works great and picks up more signals than the old system.

Just for those that need to replace it with something more reasonable than the answer RM gives.

Don,

I am trying to install a Used Raymarine C-80 that my Boss gave me when he upgraded his boat. I did not get the R125 with it, and have been trying to find a good solution. Can you provide any hint/tips/tricks you found when installing the Digital Yachts GPS150?