I was somewhat chagrined to open the latest issue of PMY and find a full page ad for an interesting new electronics system I had never heard of! I guess it’s hard to manage a world-wide product introduction; heck, even searching the Simrad Yachting site for the GB60, as this system is called, yields nada, at least today. At any rate, it’s pretty clear from the pictures and European press releases I found that Simrad Yachting has teamed up with Jeppesen Marine, i.e. Nobeltec. The PR references Passport charts, photo maps, etc. but the screen above sure looks like Admiral to me. Which is not a bad thing. Why reinvent the wheel, especially when you have all the hardware that a big Admiral glass bridge system wants to live in. When I visited Simrad a few years ago, I was surprised at how many commercial grade marine computer products they made. Hence there’s a lot of experience behind that dual processor black box PC below. Ditto the keyboard and even the cool arm rest control. Simrad has also been making, or at least OEMing, monitors for a while but these, available in 12”, 15” and 19” sizes, are a new super slim design. I dare say that a full 3 monitor GB60 system, like below (and really big here), will be pricey but powerful, and some will love that it’s all under one warranty. Intriguing detail: the system can talk NMEA 2000 (aka SimNet); will regular Nobeltec charting programs acquire 2000 soon? That would be a good thing.
Crack of dawn, really, and nearly flat calm as we’re inside Cape Cod Bay, Race Point/Provincetown on the port quarter. In the bigger version of this picture you can see some shore lights around the entrance to the CCC, as the Canal is called, from whence that ship emerged. You can also see the remnants of the bothersome light leakage I wrote about the other day, coming off the steaming light just below the compass and a little also off the green running light forward. Note that the engine gauge lights aren’t on because my mate Rich is actually running the boat from below, and Volvo automatically switches gauge lights with engine control (nice). But I had been up on this bridge from the very wee hours of the morning and, though it was clear, had much appreciated the quality of the Raymarine radar. Check the screen shot below, full size here; with the E-120 set head up at 24 mile range, that’s Race Point off my port bow, a MARPA target in the ship channel to Boston, and Cape Ann on the starboard beam. I’ve used the VRM to note that the boat’s relatively dinky 4kW dome scanner is seeing the Boston RACON buoy about 32 miles away, which seems quite good. A couple of days later we ran into thick fog when entering Fisher’s Island Sound and learned that this radar could also distinguish little outboard boats at close range, again all settings on ‘auto’. Impressive. I think the scanner may be one of Raymarine’s new models, which they’ve been rather quiet about, but I need to check that out. Eventually I will also tell you about the problems we had with this radar (nothing to do with the scanner). In the meantime, have a wonderful weekend, which is a three or four day end-of-summer Labor Day special here in the states. If you’re anywhere near me, you really should check out Windjammer Weekend, especially today’s gathering of the fleet.
I just got the new Captn. Jack’s catalog, which seems pretty quick given that Maptech just took over the operation a few months ago. The online Captn. Jack’s is also back in business, which means I can link you right through to some of the more interesting offerings:
* The fictional Jack is indeed bundling Maptech Chartbooks with Garmin plotters, as above, including putting all the on-paper waypoints into the plotter. Just the product combinations themselves look like decent deals, the waypoints a very useful bit of frosting. (I’m hoping to try the feature out).
* The Capn software (no previous relation to Captn. Jack, and different spellings retained) has now become CAPN Integra AIS, and there’s some more detail on how Maptech plans to market it. Jack is also selling the U.S. Boating Charts DVD, which I have tried (it’s excellent), both alone and nicely bundled with Memory Map.
Note that Captn. Jack’s is offering free ground shipping and a money back guarantee (though a tight one). Altogether it’s a pretty neat catalog, and probably the one most focused on marine computer navigation, though it still doesn’t thoroughly cover the products available. Isn’t it strange that Captn. Jack’s once offered almost every major ECS except the Maptech ones, and now it features Maptech’s even larger roster but is missing major products like Nobeltec, MaxSea, and RayTech?
I like putting chart screens in Course or Track Up mode, except that sometimes they jump around too much. Illustrated above is a nicety I hadn’t seen before, control over how much your track can vary before the screen turns. In a similar vein, the 8120 also has a neat “Static Navigation” control that let’s you set a SOG number under which the speed always reads 0 and COG doesn’t change. {The picture—by the way, and bigger here—is in a style I’m working to perfect: sharply focused gizmo in foreground, soft marine scene as background. That’s a Fleming 55 and a Midnight Lace back there, both lovelies.} More 8120 notes:
* A negative 8120 surprise was learning that a NMEA 0183 data-in cable is not included in the box (though it is available, and I’m getting one to see how well this MFD will handle wind and other data out of the Airmar WeatherStation). In fact, 0183 seems to be slighted in favor of Navman’s own NavBus. Thus the 8120 will only plot DSC targets coming from a Navman VHF, which is odd as that’s usually a standard 0183 function. * Build quality of the these early-off-the-line machines is a tad dicey. The first one I got wouldn’t do video and I had to use a blade to open the map cartridge door. * While I’m normally a soft key sort of guy (which may be a tester’s bias: I use so many different machines that I like to get led through the command structure), I find the 8120 key set and nested menu structure, with its nice big fonts, quite easy to navigate. * Shown below is a unique (I think) and very desirable display feature; you can vary what Navman calls the Split Ratios so that windows can be sized individually. * So far, then, a few pluses and minuses; but there’s no doubt that the 8120 is a lot MFD for the money. I won’t be able to try the SmartCraft interfacing, but it sure looks good. I will eventually test the built-in sonar (the window below is simulated) and fuel flow support. By the way, there’s a nifty promotion going on, but not much longer: if you buy an 8120, or a TrackFish 6600, before 9/1, you can get a free C-Map Mega card.
Yup, a digital radar double header. Garmin announced this stylish 4kW/4’ open array along with a 4kW/6’ model. Note again the DSP claim, “Digital processing allows for more precise recognition, enhancement, and filtering of radar echoes – making the finished display easier to read and interpret.” I only have one screen shot, taken with the $3,600 4–footer, but it does look pretty sharp (below, and bigger here). I also notice in the specs that these arrays can run at either 24 or 48 rpm, which may mean that the display software will eventually be able to show you two ranges at once, a very nice feature on some Simrad and Si-Tex radars. That’s all I’ve got for now; you all have a great weekend.
It’s digital radar Friday. It must mean something when two new scanner series are made official on the same day…a trend perhaps? Northstar’s, hinted at last winter, is called High Definition (HD) Digital Radar. and it comes in 2kW/18-inch and 4kW/24-inch radomes, as well as 6kW/48-inch, 10kW/72-inch and 25kW/84 inch open arrays. They will work with the 8000i series, mentioned yesterday, and the new 6100i update to the 6000i series (and come October, the Navman 8120 will become compatible with the smaller scanners). The press release, not online yet, boasts of “enhanced Digital Signal Processing (DSP) techniques, combined with 10-bit target discrimination, provide unparalleled radar images.” I’ve seen quite a few of those images, and they are impressive. Notice how in the one below, bigger here
, the radar is discriminating amongst all those boats moored behind a breakwater in Hobson Bay, New Zealand. Nice!
This example will be less funky once I get this whole test rig on the water, but still that’s an impressive screen shot. All that data is coming from, or calculated using, the NMEA 2000 output of Maretron’s weather station, compass, GPS, and water speed/depth sensor. The simulated ‘boat’ is underway but almost standing still (SOG = 0.1 kt) though there’s 0.8 kt of water going by the hull (me flicking the paddle wheel). True Wind then—sometimes called True Relative to Boat—is Apparent adjusted for Speed Through Water and Heading, and Ground Wind (sometimes called True!) is Apparent adjusted for COG/SOG. (A more thorough discussion of True Wind might be in order).
And—yes, contrary to yesterday’s post—there’s Barometric Pressure and Air Temp from the WSO100. It turned out that the E Series doesn’t recognize the standard NMEA 2000 “Environmental” PGN, but will display an alternate PGN that can be turned on in the WSO. This sounds like the screwy stuff that happens with NMEA 0183, and sure enough the E also has an issue with the 0183 “Environmental” sentence, which apparently is marked “do not use” in the NMEA handbook. But Airmar says it’s the only message available for pressure, temp, and relative humidity.
At any rate, the data on the screen below is all coming from Airmar’s all-in-one ultrasonic weather station (and will be joined by pressure, etc. when Raymarine does another code release). True Wind and Set/Drift aren’t calculated because there is no source of Boat Speed, though that would be easy by wiring a speed/depth Smart Sensor into the Weather Station’s Combiner box (multiplexer). Some other day I’ll discuss comparative accuracy, value, etc., but for now I think it’s impressive that the E Series (and C) can interface with both these super sensor systems. The screen shots also illustrate the vastly improved data window control that’s come to the C and E. You can customize the five preset panels pretty extensively (blame me for the asymmetrical graph cells), and use the panels full, half, or quarter screen on any given page. Well done Raymarine, Maretron, and Airmar!
Actually I’ve been watching RayTech 6.0 for quite a while, as I was kindly included in the Beta testing. I think Raymarine really got it right this time. Take a look at the full screen shot, and consider all the cartography it supports. On the left is Navionics Platinum being read off a CF card in a Navionics USB reader; RayTech seems to speedily support every Platinum feature—including blended photo maps (shown), panoramic photos, 3D, port info, tides & currents, etc. (by contrast Navionics own NavPlanner hardly supports any Platinum features, yet). On the right of course is a Maptech raster chart; other Maptech products supported are photo maps (with variable blending) and topos. Finally, you can also read NT+ charts using a C-Map reader.
And consider how many ways there are to use RayTech 6.0. You can download it for free (yes, available now), grab some free rasters, and you’re all set to plan routes that you can copy onto a CF card and take to your Raymarine C or E, or email to someone, or whatever (see below, bigger here). Or you can buy a Navionics or C-Map reader and use your plotter charts to plan on, or at least compare to the rasters, again taking the routes to the plotter via card. Or you can license your copy of 6.0, and then a single Ethernet cable feeds it everything that’s on an E Series network (Sirius weather, Navtex, and AIS excepted, for the time being). I’m trying both networked and stand alone versions, as well as the Sirius weather, am impressed by all, and will report further.
I suspect I’m not the only guy a little mopy about not being in the huge fleet headed out into the Atlantic toward Bermuda right now. In fact, the usually wonderful iboat tracking system, above, seems to be jammed up right now, I’m guessing with gawkers trying to see who started well. Iboat tracking won a Sail FKP Innovation award last year, and the write up by Deputy Editor Josh Adams is available as a PDF on iboat’s home page. Josh, who is now Sail’s Publisher (oh yes, we writers like that!), is racing on the 65’ Reichel Pugh Zaraffa, while Senior Editor Kimball Livingston is aboard the Open 50 Gryphon Solo, and Roaming Editor Charlie Doane is aboard Avocation, a Swan 48 owned by Offshore Passage Opportunities and chartered by some “Aussie lunatics”. In other words, Sail is covering this race very well. Plus Alex on Finesse is business manager of Sail and PMY, and our blog buddy Eli is racing. Shouldn’t I be meeting these boats in St. George to debrief the electronics?
PS, 6/19: iboat tracking has been working pretty well since Saturday afternoon (though you can see on the full screen that the wind overlay is a mite funky right now). Zaraffa is 1st in class (the biggest class) and 2nd overall—way to go, Josh—and even Finesse is hanging in (though promised e-mails failed to materialize).
PS, 6/20, 8am: The light air has really shaken up the usual leaders list, and the 4am unofficial leader board is showing a freakin Swan 56 as 1st overall, Josh 2nd, and Doane (w/ “Aussie lunatics”) an astounding 20th. Can’t wait to see who the real winners will be.
PS, 6/22: I fixed the link above to the “real winners” list, and it’s now almost totally complete. As of last night, there are still some boats out there, like Chase, skippered by Ocean Navigator publisher Alex Agnew. Also discovered that Kimball Livingston has put a couple of good posts about his Gryphon Solo race.
So here’s where I was during some of Wednesday’s Northeaster, on the bridge—tightly enclosed, thank goodness—of Dennis Barca’s spanking new 2006 Sea Ray 44 Sedan Bridge. The occasion was a chance to observe the training portion of the “Red Carpet Advantage” which Maptech includes with that Sea Ray Navigator on the dash, also known as a SRN, and also marketed as the i3. The Red Carpet concept means that if a new owner like Barca registers SRN (who wouldn’t?), he gets an extra year of warranty, for a total of three, and a two hour SRN orientation onboard his own vessel. The training is wisely scheduled for a few weeks after he or she has taken possession of the boat and has thus had a chance to try the SRN and develop questions. In fact, Barca had already owned a smaller Sea Ray with the first generation SRN on board. He definitely noticed the many improvements in this third edition (well described at Maptech), as did I. The tutorial was delivered by Rick Kilborn, below, founder of a neat training organization called Boatwise, which offers all sorts of courses including docking using your own vessel, and has been contracted and trained by Maptech to deliver the Red Carpet in New England. At any rate, it was too soggy/windy to get underway but I think Barca learned more than he already knew about his SRN, and he’s definitely a satisfied customer (as can been seen better in bigger versions of the pictures above and below).
