Chartplotter Vs. PC based set-up, questions???

[bmartinsen]

[. for instance if an object of a certain size gets within a specific proximity to my vessel. . . anyway, you get the picture.


I'd like to see a radar that can do this. Your asking a lot from a radio wave bounicing off something. I have a raymarine C70 and the blip on the screen may be a cruiseship or a sailboat with good radar reflectors. My advice is anything capable of giving you a blip should be avoided. Alarms can be sounded that a blip is on srceen. I have 2 laptops, both able to interface to the nema bus as Backup to everything else but use dedicated
equipment for each job, they can all talk. My autopilots(2) can talk to my 2 gps's and wind, but you still need paper as back-up. Power consumption and reliablity being paramount. All the electronics on my boat have failed at some time, including the compass lite at 3am in a sqall ( this was really annoying) but only one at a time.
IMhO spend your money on lots of good solar panels over wind generators,
I'd gladly trade my wind generator for 2 more panels. In the caribbean solar works well.

btw. remove passwords on start -up a wet keyboard can ruin your day
learn all you can about amp/hours
cheers
Brad

[gmalan]

I have a chartplotter on the helm on S/V Sunny Spells as well as the ability to run a laptop with Software-on-Board, using the C-Map cartridges from my Navman Chartplotter (S.V. Sunny Spells · Navigation Systems).

1. The laptop draws around 4 to 5 amps. The chartplotter, autopilot, AIS, instruments - in fact everything else - draws less than 2 amps when it's all running. This single one fact rules out the laptop for primary navigation.

2. A chartplotter really comes into its own when navigating around obstructions, making landfall at night, or when avoiding traffic using radar or AIS. The rest of the time you can plot a grid reference on a map. So really, you need it at the helm. A laptop can't do that unless you want to risk it getting wet.

3. You can now buy a small colour chartplotter with AIS for well under $1000 (Navman), and I'm considering fitting one as backup in the nav station so I can check on it when I'm off-watch at night. Running the laptop is not an option because of the amp-draw.

4. Chartplotters, in my experience, are very reliable. How often does your "Windoze" laptop freeze, crash, restart... I wouldn't bet my life on a laptop!

I always carry a laptop, but it primarily gets used for planning, for writing my blog and keeping in touch via e-mail. It's also good for troubleshooting NMEA issues...

[bstreep]

I've got both. The laptop is just about unusable. Seriously, the software crashes all the time (maptech).

[dplatner]

gmalan,

What kind of software or hardware do you use for "troubleshooting NMEA issues"?

Dale

[gmalan]

Originally Posted by dplatner

gmalan,

What kind of software or hardware do you use for "troubleshooting NMEA issues"?

Dale

Hi Dale,

My Brookhouse multiplexer has a USB output, so I run that to my laptop. The laptop recognizes the multiplexer as a COM (serial) port, running at 9600bps, so I just use Hyperterminal (included with Windows) to view the incoming data stream.

Let me know if you need more detail and I can provide more info offline as we'd probably drift off topic...

[Pblais]

What kind of software or hardware do you use for "troubleshooting NMEA issues"?

There are only a few problems you might have to deal with. Testing the continuity of the 3 wires you might have running around and a failed serial port on the receiving or sending end. For the most part the real world says it works or it does not if it ever worked at all. If you consider most NMEA devices have embedded serial ports I doubt you could repair one in the field. If you don't know how to connect devices then that information would of course be useful. If the wiring is properly set up there isn't much that can go wrong.

Making a test setup with a short cable that you know works would be the best way to test devices.

My Brookhouse multiplexer has a USB output, so I run that to my laptop. The laptop recognizes the multiplexer as a COM (serial) port, running at 9600bps, so I just use Hyperterminal (included with Windows) to view the incoming data stream.

That's not a bad idea but if you can read the data then it's more likely the case that you don't have a problem to troubleshoot. You also don't need a multiplexer to do it. If you are multiplexing more than one source then you would want to isolate them one at a time to see which device was faulty or see if it was the multiplexer itself that was the problem.