I must go down to the sea again, in a modern high-tech boat, And all I ask is electric, for comfort while afloat, And alternators, and solar panels, and generators going, and deep cycle batteries with many amperes flowing. I must go down to the sea again, to the autopilot’s ways, And all I ask is a GPS, and a radar, and displays, And a cell phone, and a weatherfax, and a shortwave radio, And compact disks, computer games and TV videos. I must go down to the sea again, with a freezer full of steaks, And all I ask is a microwave, and a blender for milkshakes, And a watermaker, air-conditioner, hot water in the sink, And e-mail and a VHF to see what my buddies think. I must go down to the sea again, with power-furling sails, And chart displays of all the seas, and a bullhorn for loud hails, And motors pulling anchor chains, and push-button sheets, And programs which take full charge of tacking during beats. I must go down to the sea again, and not leave friends behind, And so they never get seasick we’ll use the web online, And all I ask is an Internet with satellites over me, And beaming all the data up, my friends sail virtually. I must go down to the sea again, record the humpback whales, Compute until I decipher their language and their tales, And learn to sing in harmony, converse beneath the waves, And befriend the gentle giants as my synthesizer plays. I must go down to the sea again, with RAM in gigabytes, and teraflops of processing for hobbies that I like, And software suiting all my wants, seated at my console And pushing on the buttons which give me complete control. I must go down to the sea again, my concept seems quite sound, But when I simulate this boat, some problems I have found. The cost is astronomical, repairs will never stop, Instead of going sailing, I’ll be shackled to the dock. I must go down to the sea again, how can I get away? Must I be locked in low-tech boats until my dying day? Is there no cure for my complaint, no technologic fix? Oh, I fear electric fever is a habit I can’t kick. And software suiting all my wants, seated at my console And pushing on the buttons which give me complete control. I must go down to the sea again, my concept seems quite sound, But when I simulate this boat, some problems I have found. The cost is astronomical, repairs will never stop, Instead of going sailing, I’ll be shackled to the dock. I must go down to the sea again, how can I get away? Must I be locked in low-tech boats until my dying day? Is there no cure for my complaint, no technologic fix? Oh, I fear electric fever is a habit I can’t kick. ###
Hey, someone sent it to me! My reaction: read it out loud, it’s pretty darn good. And there are some snippets of truth in there, but the electronics cat is way out of the bag. For instance, contemplate the fleet of floating technology I see out my hotel window (telephoto).
Woot sells one product a day, either until it’s sold out or the next day comes along. Shipping is always $5, and the sales pitch is usually a riot. Today’s deal is a Lowrance iFinder handheld mapping GPS, similar to the one I’ve been trying, for $140. Good machine, excellent price I think.
You’d think I’d know more about this than I actually do! Apparently Voyaging Magazine—for which I write a column called Helm Shot (only the first one is online, unfortunately)—is running a ‘makeover’ style contest in which the winner will get a whole Furuno NavNet vx2 electronics system installed in his or her boat. Nice! Now Voyaging (created by PMY) is about powerboat cruising, so you have to own that sort of boat. Then you need to take some decent pictures of your current setup and write an essay of up to 1,200 words describing it and explaining “how winning brand-new Furuno equipment would improve your cruising lifestyle.” The winner will be chosen by a panel of Voyaging and Furuno experts (including me) “based on the creativity and originality of the essay and photographs entered.” I’m sure Voyaging and Furuno will do a lot of promotion about this contest (which ends in June), but how many folks will actually enter? Sounds like an opportunity.
If, on the other hand, you’ve already put together a cruising power boat electronics package that you are particularly proud of, maybe you’d let me profile it and you for Voyaging. There’s no prize, except for a few free copies, but it is fun. Write me.
Weird! I was just writing an entry giving Lowrance some grief about their NauticPath charts, when a stock trading friend of mine called. “What the hell is going on with Lowrance?” says he (as I had once suggested LEIX as a possibly good investment). After a few minutes a release came up on Business Wire, excerpted here:
Simrad Yachting AS and Lowrance Electronics, Inc. (Nasdaq:LEIX) announced today that Simrad Yachting has agreed to acquire all of the outstanding shares of Lowrance for $37 per share… Darrell Lowrance, the current Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Lowrance who founded the company in 1957 and is still its largest shareholder, will become the Chief Executive Officer of the combined company. Jan Berner, the current Chief Executive Officer of Simrad Yachting, will become Deputy Chief Executive Officer and lead the integration work.
Wow, Simrad and Lowrance are quite the combination…I’m still reeling over the implications. One thing I’m feeling very good about is the big kit of Lowrance gear that arrived for testing last week. I’ve been thinking for some time that Lowrance deserves more attention in the saltwater, bigger boat world, but my timing is really, really lucky. I also I think my buddy owes me a nice dinner out.
Imagine the VHF calls! “This IS M/V Emergency Mental Services. How can we be of help?” This beaut is the yard boat of the very good humored Westerly Marina in Ossining, NY, seen on my Hudson cruise last fall. On closer inspection you’ll see that Marine Response Unit No. 10 probably once worked at Emergency Enviromental Services. Meanwhile, up the river in Newburgh, is a boat I would not like to vocalize on the radio. Just too stupid:
Well, would you believe that I’m writing this from the cockpit of the Leopard 42’ catamaran above, riding on a mooring at Great Guana Cay, Abaco, Bahamas? Uploading to Panbo via an ISP that’s nicely blanketed the cruising harbors in WiFi? Ha ha! Oh there was the hellish getting here, which included a pre dawn Sunday drive through a sleet storm and idiot me forgetting his passport, which caused a lay over in a grungy Ft. Lauderdale Econolodge, then USAir temporarily ‘misplacing’ the passport my dear wife had driven to Portland and put on a plane. Ah, but did I mention that I’m sitting in shorts and a t-shirt as the sun comes up? So the deal here is that I am attending an Offshore Sailing School Catamaran Live Aboard Cruising Course on behalf of Sail magazine. There’s one other student and an instructor, both fine guys, and I’m excited about sailing one of these beasts. I also brought along a lot of different electronic charts of this area to try out and compare. So, more later…if and when we stop in right place WiFi wise.
Mike Slinn’s weblog sounds like a tabloid: “The dangerous secret about Raymarine radars that the manufacturer doesn’t want you to know.” Well, I read all the correspondence Mike posted and don’t understand at all how he’s come to the conclusions he has. It looks to me like various Raymarine people responded to all his issues—even though some are just RTFM (read the blanking manual) simple—and meanwhile Mike apparently hasn’t even taken their advice to update his firmware and check his power supply. I also question his concept of using this dinky radar, or any radar, to “catch up on sleep without compromising safety”. So what do you all think of Mike’s gripes, which he’s posting all over (like here, here, here, and here), and has anyone heard of another boat with this problem of a constantly resetting Raymarine radar scanner?
By the way, Mike is certainly not the first really, really unhappy marine electronics customer I’ve come across. Supposedly one went so far as to hire a plane to tow a derogatory banner over the Miami Boat Show a few years ago! Is this a particularly strong phenomenon in the world of boats? I think so, but not because marine electronics (or boats) are particularly poor…but because we care about them so much.
I don’t know anything about OptiMax, right, except that it popped up in our Google Ads when I wrote about touch screens. But I’m curious because I think screen cleaning is a serious subject! Last fall, when I borrowed PMY’s Luhrs to go up the Hudson, one of the twin Raymarine C-120’s at the helm had a really messed up screen, obviously the result of someone rubbing on the wrong fluid or with the wrong cloth. I’ve heard of Furuno NavNet screens being ruined with Windex glass cleaner. The point is that many modern marine electronics screens are surfaced with anti-glare coatings that are susceptible to damage. So how should we get the darn things clean? What do you use? Is it true that paper towels can scratch some displays? Have you ever checked your manual on this subject? Seriously, manufacturers and users, please tell us what works, and what’s dangerous.
I get some wonderfully strange Holiday cards. Not every marine electronics company tries to make their’s thematic, or even sends one, but still I get excited every time I open an envelope. So far this year’s stand out is Airmar, which has Santa checking gauges on the PC version of Weather Station.
So here’s a geekish Happy Holidays to all of you. I’m off to New York City for a few days (how convenient that the buses and subways went on strike at 3am this morning!), back next week.
I’m curious; how big is the worldwide recreational marine electronics market? As best I can tell no trade organization is trying to keep track. In the U.S., NMMA publishes interesting statistics, but doesn’t break out electronics. Some manufacturers are public companies and hence provide clues. For instance, Raymarine’s financials show 135 million in annual worldwide sales. Lowrance posts 146 million in sales, but some of that comes from automobile and terrestrial handheld products. Similarly, Garmin doesn’t distinguish marine from other recreational sales (and some of the products areindistinguishable).
At any rate, a certain smart marketing fellow told me that his best guess for the whole enchilada is 1.2 billion dollars. Several other other people in the business agree, plus or minus 20%. That’s not very big. Heck, my local health care operation—hospital, old age facility, etc serving maybe 50,000 people—is over 100 million in revenue. I read that electronic gifts in the U.S. this year will top 17 billion dollars!
No wonder than that I once heard a ranking marine electronics executive call it a “cottage industry”. The intriguing thing, I guess, is that no one company dominates. Plus, while boat ownership is not growing very fast, sales of “aftermarket accessories” increased 14% in the U.S. last year (from NMMA’s free 2004 Recreational Boating Statistical Abstract). And humans in general are crazy about electronics (see 17 billion figure).
Woot
me like various Raymarine people responded to all his issues—even though some are just RTFM (read the blanking manual) simple—and meanwhile Mike apparently hasn’t even taken their advice to update his firmware and check his power supply. I also question his concept of using this dinky radar, or any radar, to “catch up on sleep without compromising safety”. So what do you all think of Mike’s gripes, which he’s posting all over (like 
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