Installing radar on Hunter 326
- Thread starter Dmac336
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You need to pick a brand...
1- Choose brand; Garmin, Raymarine, Furuno
2- Choose radome; An 18" HD dome would be a good choice.
3- Buy a mast mount; I like the one made by Sea View but there are plenty of others.
4- Mount plotter/display at helm; Usually a NavPod is a good solution.
Right now choosing the brand is where you are at. I did this same exercise last summer and chose Garmin. Instruments are more about how you interact with them so go play with them and see whose user interface you like.
If you intend to do radar overlay on your plotter you'll want a rate gyro sensor or the echos won't line up with the land as often as you'd like them too... I think Raymarine calls them a "Smart Heading Sensor". If you have an AP with a rate gyro built in you can just NEMA this data to your plotter..
Mast is a good choice but you'll find it much easier to snake the wire and install the mount with the spar off the boat.
1- Choose brand; Garmin, Raymarine, Furuno
2- Choose radome; An 18" HD dome would be a good choice.
3- Buy a mast mount; I like the one made by Sea View but there are plenty of others.
4- Mount plotter/display at helm; Usually a NavPod is a good solution.
Right now choosing the brand is where you are at. I did this same exercise last summer and chose Garmin. Instruments are more about how you interact with them so go play with them and see whose user interface you like.
If you intend to do radar overlay on your plotter you'll want a rate gyro sensor or the echos won't line up with the land as often as you'd like them too... I think Raymarine calls them a "Smart Heading Sensor". If you have an AP with a rate gyro built in you can just NEMA this data to your plotter..
Forward on the mast is the best location but beware of the limited space between the headsail and the mast when tacking. We have knocked off two TV antennas on separate occasions when tacking in winds of 30+ knots. The boats are fractional rig so perhaps above the headsaty connector may be a good place.
Why do you want it on the mast?
If you order a stern radar mount from Garhauer you can mount other items without much ado. You will gain some range with a mast mount but you also have to deal with the jib/radar unit interference.
If you order a stern radar mount from Garhauer you can mount other items without much ado. You will gain some range with a mast mount but you also have to deal with the jib/radar unit interference.
Easy
It is way easy to mount on a pole on the stern but the pole to mount is not cheap.
If you are doing it yourself it would be way easy for you to do,usually you to drop mast to mount on mast and not cheap either,I did the mast mounting on the first boat and had the mast dropped and did all the labor and did add a wind machine also and I did the cable install not easy but I did save lot's $$$$.
I have Raymarine C-80 with Radar at the helm on my new Hunter 36 added at the Factory and like it.
Nick
It is way easy to mount on a pole on the stern but the pole to mount is not cheap.
If you are doing it yourself it would be way easy for you to do,usually you to drop mast to mount on mast and not cheap either,I did the mast mounting on the first boat and had the mast dropped and did all the labor and did add a wind machine also and I did the cable install not easy but I did save lot's $$$$.
I have Raymarine C-80 with Radar at the helm on my new Hunter 36 added at the Factory and like it.
Nick
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I had the 4000 on my 290 Hunter and now have the S1 on my 36 Hunter.
It has the rudder position and like that,it does a very good job and has a lot of other things you can do but haven't had a chance to use,it does very well as an auto.
I did have a problem with it on my trip from NY down to Florida off shore in the Atlantic in very tuff seas,but I think my folding steering wheel really did it in.
Up in NY it always did well as long as you did not over power it and just trim the sails properly,if you did over power it it would tell you.
I did send it back to Raymarine under warranty and they replaced and it worked
fine on my offshore trip from Fort Pierce,Fl to the keys and than up to Punta Gorda.
No complaints and still learning some of the features reading the book.
Nick
I had the 4000 on my 290 Hunter and now have the S1 on my 36 Hunter.
It has the rudder position and like that,it does a very good job and has a lot of other things you can do but haven't had a chance to use,it does very well as an auto.
I did have a problem with it on my trip from NY down to Florida off shore in the Atlantic in very tuff seas,but I think my folding steering wheel really did it in.
Up in NY it always did well as long as you did not over power it and just trim the sails properly,if you did over power it it would tell you.
I did send it back to Raymarine under warranty and they replaced and it worked
fine on my offshore trip from Fort Pierce,Fl to the keys and than up to Punta Gorda.
No complaints and still learning some of the features reading the book.
Nick
Attachments
http://www.sailnet.com/forums/gear-maintenance-articles/19742-installing-radar.html
research I have done, seems to indicate mast makes most sense....also recent article in Sail suggests mounting mid mast rather than high up to improve perfromance in functionality....mast is Selden furling with cable chamber toward bow- - thought was to drill into this to run cables down and into cabin..from there, power to panel and snake display cable to helm..is it more complicated than I am seeing it?
research I have done, seems to indicate mast makes most sense....also recent article in Sail suggests mounting mid mast rather than high up to improve perfromance in functionality....mast is Selden furling with cable chamber toward bow- - thought was to drill into this to run cables down and into cabin..from there, power to panel and snake display cable to helm..is it more complicated than I am seeing it?
Some thoughts to keep in mind. Put the radar up the mast where you have the afore mentioned issues, or a pole mount which hasnt been really talked about. The mast mount is neater, cleaner, and way more difficult to deal with if you have maintenance issues. Not to mention installation. Next, what is the scope of what you want your radar to do. Do you want to navigate in fog on the way back to the slip, cross some shipping lanes, or do you want to see a hundred targets that appear and then dont on the next scan. A 2k scanner will only have the ability to paint a sailboat size target, if sea and weather permits, out to about 6 miles. It will paint a cruise ship farther, maybe 10-12 miles tops. Its the power (of the radar) that is available. A 4k can do better but you need a significant amount of amp hours... but why. Not very practical on a sailboat. Whether you do a pole mount at about 8-10 feet on your stern or a mast mount, you are not really buying yourself that much (curvature of the earth). Also remember the higher up the mast, assuming your not doing a gimbal mount, the more beam errors do to angles created by pitch and roll, hence a very difficult to read radar presentation. IMHO, you need to know what is inside of 3-5 miles, and no sh*t what is inside 2 when it comes to traffic. You will be able to interpret the picture more easily. Breaking out a jetty at sailboat speeds , or bouys... well it doesnt matter if the scanner is sitting on the foredeck! You can read the picture.
Just food for thought
Cheers
Just food for thought
Cheers
Dmac
As said yes it is mounting the radar up the mast and drilling the holes into the mast and running the cable into the mast and down into the cabin up to the helm.
What I did call Selden and ask how my model furling mast ran the cables,mine was just to the front side back a few inches,they Selden were very helpful.
Plenty of advice doing it on this forum,worked out much better for me to drop the mast to add the wind machine at the top and the radar mid way just above the spreaders.
Nick
As said yes it is mounting the radar up the mast and drilling the holes into the mast and running the cable into the mast and down into the cabin up to the helm.
What I did call Selden and ask how my model furling mast ran the cables,mine was just to the front side back a few inches,they Selden were very helpful.
Plenty of advice doing it on this forum,worked out much better for me to drop the mast to add the wind machine at the top and the radar mid way just above the spreaders.
Nick
I installed the mast mounted Raydome on my H33. You will need the mast mount dish and extra cable. There was ample room in the mast, through the headliner and up through the pedestal to my Navpod and C80 chartplotter. I purchased the parts on-line (used Defender but Dave is pretty good as well) and had the radar installed and hooked up for about $400.00. If the installation fee seems high, it was well worth it after watching the installation. Since our boats are just about the same size it should be the same.
Last year I sailed the ocean down the Florida coast to the Keys and beyond and now swear by a radar. I will never be without one again. You may not need one if you stay in the ICW but going outside it's a must. Good luck.
Last year I sailed the ocean down the Florida coast to the Keys and beyond and now swear by a radar. I will never be without one again. You may not need one if you stay in the ICW but going outside it's a must. Good luck.
Dmac, I helped my friend install his Raymarine C70/2KW radrome on his H33 mast just about 10 ft up from deck. We use a vertical ladder. At this height, its higher than pole mount and yet the stock cable is sufficient to reach the C70 mounted on pedestial grab rail. As for H326, running the cable should be easy from the entry box (on deck infront of mast), within the liner (skip the embedded conduit as its too small) to port side electrical panel, down to just below the Head floor, across to stern in conduit and thro to transom locker, up to cockpit deck where steering cable exit and under cockpit floor (where steering arm is) and into the grab rail and to the pedestial instrument box. From there you decide how you want it make.
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