Chart plotter choice overwhelm

[Tin Kicker]

I'll agree that watching for a bundle is a great way to go, but add that the B&G Vulcan 7 occasionally can be found for $499. I installed that at the chart desk and mirror it at the helm on an iPad. Works great.

Before even considering an auto helm, you'll go thru your budget by adding a depth transducer for $300, wind sensor for $550-$700 and heading/rate/GPS puck for $300. Leave off the wind sensor and you could barely make it but the wind sensor adds a lot of functionality.

 

[jssailem]

The only way to get real time AIS is to have an AIS receiver.

AIS receiver is a helpful tool in the Puget Sound / Salish Sea due to the traffic of big ships required to have and transmit their location as they travel at high speed (18-20 knots) through the NW waters. It gives advanced warning as you drift in a current in light breezes. The AIS service from Vessel Finder or MarineTraffic are often delayed or intermittent. Not reliable for safe navigation.

I chose early to install a Standard Horizon GC2200 VHF Radio. Chosen at the time for its GPS/AIS and DCS capabilities. Works great. The AIS gives me location , speed, bearing of traffic. It provides CPA or TCPA and Programmable collision avoidance alarms. Gets my attention while I'm trim sails or just gazing out on the water.

I then added a Vesper Marine AIS transponder when I found a nice discount at the Seattle Boat Show. It provides data to up to 5 links using a wifi gateway. It accepts NEMA 2000 & 0183 data from sensor sources and displays it on a wifi device. This gives me the data real time on iPhone/iPad/MAC & PC laptops. I can run OpenCPN, iNavx, Coastal Explorer..etc and have realtime data. It has paid off it’s cost many times.

Is it possible to get AIS to the ipad via VHF if there is no cell service?

Yes. see above.

David has provided a viable alternative strategy that works.

 

[jssailem]

Depending on your style of sailing, having detailed wind data is either nice or required.

Racing it can give you an edged that will get you across the line sooner than a competitor. Cruising it can give you numbers to use that trigger changes in sail trim as instructed in sailing class… “when the wind gets to 16knots reef the main sail “.

I do not have the wind transduce on my boat. So I can‘t tell you, “man, it was blowing 63 knots last night”. I can tell you “ It was really blowing. It was more than 35 based on the whistling in the rigging, an probably more than 50 based on the strain of the dock lines.“

Depending on the sea state you can judge the approximate wind speeds. When I see white caps on 60% of the waves it is time to reef the main.

Here is a link for those sailors who want to know the relationship of wind and sea state with clues to wind speed.

Beaufort Scale

 

[jssailem]

OpenCPN ( https://opencpn.org/index.html ) lists the following info on Canadian Charts that can be purchased and uploaded.

​

Commercial Chart Sources for OpenCPN​

O-charts.org​

Worldwide ENC coverage is available for use on OpenCPN 4.0 and above. S63 Encrypted ENC chart permits also available. Affordable. The O-Charts Plugin is required.​

​

Canadian Hydrographic Service (CHS)​

Canadian Charts BSB4 format.​

(Note: O-Charts carries affordable official licensed Canadian charts now.)​

 

[Terry Cox]

Here is a used Garmin 178C sounder that is worth considering. GARMIN GPSMAP 178C SOUNDER MARINE GPS CHART PLOTTER FISHFINDER DISPLAY w/ MOUNT | eBay

Need to ask whether it includes a depth shoot-through-the-hull transponder. Need it for the Sounder feature to work. Also whether you can still get a data card with the charts for our region.

 

[mforum]

I'll agree that watching for a bundle is a great way to go, but add that the B&G Vulcan 7 occasionally can be found for $499. I installed that at the chart desk and mirror it at the helm on an iPad. Works great.

Before even considering an auto helm, you'll go thru your budget by adding a depth transducer for $300, wind sensor for $550-$700 and heading/rate/GPS puck for $300. Leave off the wind sensor and you could barely make it but the wind sensor adds a lot of functionality.

I have a tacktick wireless wind system nm100 analog which came with the boat; I’m not sure if the wireless signal could be input to the Vulcan 7 or not, or how to figure that out. I’m planning to haul out the boat in next several months for bottom painting and was thinking to change the depth transducer then. The vulcan 7R looks appealing, just want to try to avoid dealing with incompatibility headaches between depth transducers and gauges or chart plotters.

 

[mforum]

AIS receiver is a helpful tool in the Puget Sound / Salish Sea due to the traffic of big ships required to have and transmit their location as they travel at high speed (18-20 knots) through the NW waters. It gives advanced warning as you drift in a current in light breezes. The AIS service from Vessel Finder or MarineTraffic are often delayed or intermittent. Not reliable for safe navigation.

I chose early to install a Standard Horizon GC2200 VHF Radio. Chosen at the time for its GPS/AIS and DCS capabilities. Works great. The AIS gives me location , speed, bearing of traffic. It provides CPA or TCPA and Programmable collision avoidance alarms. Gets my attention while I'm trim sails or just gazing out on the water.

I then added a Vesper Marine AIS transponder when I found a nice discount at the Seattle Boat Show. It provides data to up to 5 links using a wifi gateway. It accepts NEMA 2000 & 0183 data from sensor sources and displays it on a wifi device. This gives me the data real time on iPhone/iPad/MAC & PC laptops. I can run OpenCPN, iNavx, Coastal Explorer..etc and have realtime data. It has paid off it’s cost many times.


Yes. see above.

David has provided a viable alternative strategy that works.

I have a Standard Horizon Eclipse DSC radio (GX1000S on the back). The manuel shows it has an accessory cable with blue (NMEA input +), green (NMEA ground - ), purple (NMEA output +) which can be connected to a GPS reciever. It says the GX1000S can read NMEA 0183 version 2.0 or higher. Would the Vesper Marine AIS transponder you mentioned above connect to the radio accessory cable and/or GPS unit? I’m having difficulty picturing the connection schematics. I don’t think my radio has GPS built in.

 

[jssailem]

The Vesper Marine unit is the WatchMate XB-8000 smartAIS
It has its own GPS antenna.
here is a link to the data.

VHF Marine Radios | AIS Transceivers | Garmin

While on the water, Garmin VHF radios and Automatic Identification System (AIS) transceivers help you stay in touch and stay safe.

shop.vespermarine.com

Reading the GX1000S manual, the radio needs an outside GPS source. That is why you need the “GPS” receiver. A receiver uses its own GPS antenna. It would share the data with your radio using the connection you mentioned. At least that is the way I interpreted the manual.

The lack of GPS internal antenna would mean the radio can not tell the CG where you are in the DSC mode to broadcast an emergency signal.

This information is found on pg 32&33 of the manual. https://www.standardhorizon.com/downloadFile.cfm?FileID=4659&FileCatID=86&FileName=GX1000S+Owner's+Manual.pdf&FileContentType=application/pdf

 

[mforum]

Thanks John,that’s very helpful.

 

[iNavX]

If you have an NMEA capable VHF you could get an NMEA to Wi-Fi bridge that puts the AIS sentences out for consumption by the iPad.

There are also ways to use a Raspberry Pi to receive VHF directly and create the appropriate NMEA0183 sentences on Wi-Fi. But those are definitely more technically complex

I did this with iNavX on my boat with a Vesper XB-8000 transceiver that put all the ships NMEA data out there for the iPad. Worked like a charm.

Any third party bridge should work though, as long as it's putting NMEA out on the WiFi network.

 

[iNavX]

The Vesper Marine unit is the WatchMate XB-8000 smartAIS
It has its own GPS antenna.
here is a link to the data.

VHF Marine Radios | AIS Transceivers | Garmin

While on the water, Garmin VHF radios and Automatic Identification System (AIS) transceivers help you stay in touch and stay safe.

shop.vespermarine.com

Reading the GX1000S manual, the radio needs an outside GPS source. That is why you need the “GPS” receiver. A receiver uses its own GPS antenna. It would share the data with your radio using the connection you mentioned. At least that is the way I interpreted the manual.

The lack of GPS internal antenna would mean the radio can not tell the CG where you are in the DSC mode to broadcast an emergency signal.

This information is found on pg 32&33 of the manual. https://www.standardhorizon.com/downloadFile.cfm?FileID=4659&FileCatID=86&FileName=GX1000S+Owner's+Manual.pdf&FileContentType=application/pdf

Thanks John,that’s very helpful.

It's important to note that any AIS Transponder requires it's own GPS antenna to be considered AIS B "Approved." Some AIS transponders have built-in internal antennas, but these don't often work especially well installed belowdecks. So many come bundled with an external GPS antenna to connect directly to the unit, especially those without internal GPS antennas.

That doesn't mean you can't fool some of them, when I was installing my XB-8000 it was able to use the already installed Furuno GPS on the N2K network to test it out before installing the dedicated antenna. But it should add it's own GPS directly connected to it. Note that it will repeat that data so other devices are able to use it.

This radio is NMEA 0183, do depending on what AIS system you have, you may need to bridge/convert it from N2K if the transponder does not support 0183 directly (like the XB-8000).

 

[Barnacle Bill]

Airmar supplies transducers for many different brands of knot meter manufacturers.

 

[4arch]

Sorry to revive an old thread but for anyone looking at this, West Marine has the Raymarine Axiom 9 on sale for $599 for the holidays. That's within the budget stated by the OP and only $100 more than what was being quoted as a good price for a 7 inch unit earlier in the thread. Seriously considering as an upgrade to my 5 inch Garmin.

 

[jaysweet]

Sorry to revive an old thread but for anyone looking at this, West Marine has the Raymarine Axiom 9 on sale for $599 for the holidays. That's within the budget stated by the OP and only $100 more than what was being quoted as a good price for a 7 inch unit earlier in the thread. Seriously considering as an upgrade to my 5 inch Garmin.

I got an Axiom 9 fror a bit more than that a couple of years ago. Very happy with it. Probably paid $750 or so, so 600 is a steal!