Well I am pretty damn frustrated with the GPS on my Lowrance LCX 37c continuously crapping out intermittenly (even after replacing the LGC 3000 antenna and triple checking the wiring, fuses, power supply, etc).
I am thinking of replacing the Lowrance antenna (which from my research seem to have serious quality control problems) with a GPS antenna from either Maretron or Airmar. These are both NMEA 2000 compliant and should be compatible with my unit.
Has anyone out there done anything like this to solve this problem?
Any advice to which antenna to go with, Airmar or Maretron?
Does anyone out there have any advice on replacing my Lowrance LGC 3000 GPS antenna with a Airmar or Maretron antenna???
I've run Lowrance displays fine with all sorts of NMEA 2000 GPS sensors, even the internal ones built into other manufacturers displays.
However, you will need a same brand display to manage settings on the GPS. But those settings -- like enabling WASS or setting the sensor's altitude -- are not usually important to use.
I understand that at least the early LGC 3000 GPS units sometimes failed, but I've never had trouble with the two I've used. Plus I think that Lowrance's new LGC-4000 high speed GPS (5 real refreshes per second) sounds really interesting, particularly if you have a fast boat.
The Garmin 17X NMEA 2000 GPS seems to be especially sensitive and able to find position quickly. The GPS in the Airmar PB200 also seems good (but does not like being zapped by a nearby 4kW radome ;-)