Furuno 1720 Radar

[JulianGullsway]

Morning All from a very cold London, I have managed to get the above mentioned Radar working with a little TLC and seems fine, however it is rather hard to make out smaller yachts from our mooring on the River Crouch but with a little practice it seems fine we were considering up grading but it seem a very expensive option when you think of the actual time you end up using these devices, we sail Northern France and cross the English channel regularly and plan at some stage to go further, just wondered if any one had any thoughts?

[witchcraft]

We have radar which has proven useful from time to time...offshore, and inshore when weather socks in. All things are a compromise. Do you feel comfortable without it? Will the upgrade make your sailing safer? Do you have AIS ( which is likely only useful for commercial vessels)?
Sorry I really only have questions for you. Answering them will perhaps give you your answer.
If this is something you are likely to use a lot, it may very well be time to replace it.
There are some great packages available now that have chartplotter, radar and sonar all in one deal. some of them are around the same price or less than a stand alone unit. Might want to check those out.
Fair winds

[HunterWanderer]

I have a 1720 and its great. You do have to reduce rain setting though to get it to be super sensitive. With this I can see seagulls from 1/2 mile and the flags on crabpots at 1/4 mile.
Set sea state and gain to auto I find best.

[barnakiel]

We used the 16xx model it was good. I think the 17xx should outshine the 16 in every respect. I like Furunos a lot.

Day in day out we use the Rays, they are OK but not my faves.

Small Simrads with color screen are very nice and easy to read.

b.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by JulianGullsway

, just wondered if any one had any thoughts?

I was just remembering the lesson about run-on sentences from third grade.

[JulianGullsway]

Cheers Hunter, not sure ours has an Auto setting, as for seeing seagulls that would be interesting, last time we came back from France we had a weather system that surrounded us, I wish to hell it was working then couldn't see anything Vis was down to 1 mile, not fun........ As for AIS it is on our wish list, thank you for all your comments. What a site!!!

[Charlie]

Hi Jullian I have the 1721 MkII. In an effort to learn to use it better I sometimes run it in the daytime. Coming back from Catalina Island (west coast of California) to the mainland there were a bunch of 35' to 45' power boats that I couldn't see on the radar. They were the new ones with rounded edges etc. Perhaps a very experienced radar man could get it to work but not me. BTW I had a ships captain with 25 years of high seas experience on my boat and he said it was a good radar -- better then some of the ones he had started with on ships. I would like to replace mine but won't do so till this one dies.