I debated long and hard between a wired vs. wireless wind instrument. I wanted to share my experience with a Garmin G-Wind-Wireless for anyone thinking about that purchase. I purchased it back in March from WM more than any reason for convenience and the extended warranty. I purchased the Garmin to go with my Garmin 541s which is an MFD so I did not have to purchase a display unit. I set up a NMEA 2000 network and installed the Gwind transducer, wireless receiver and GND10 box. It worked great first time out of the box. After three months it began to work intermittently, it would work well for most of the day then just go blank, then be blank at start up then pop up fifteen minutes later. This intermittent nature seemed to increase. I called Garmin support and they were super helpful. I tweaked the unit with some software as Garmin support suggested…no luck, then with their help I proceeded to replace each component and wires one at a time in an attempt to isolate which one might be the culprit. I moved the wireless receiver to a variety of locations, nothing fixed it. The NMEA network was solid, they reviewed the NMEA network and when hooked into the GND 10 my lap top always received data from the 541s even when it the wind data was not being received. So now I have decided to make the switch to the wired Garmin version, I am staying with Garmin Gwind, because of the customer service effort I received and that all the other wind instruments seem to require the purchase of a screen on which to view it, thus increasing the price of admission meaningfully. I thought it would be worth the extra hundred bucks in purchase price not to hassle with getting a wire down the mast. “Ah the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” I don't think my experience was the normal one but it was the one I had.
