Quote:
Originally Posted by Wolfhound
Any thoughts four years later?
Lower prices & higher sophistication of units available...
Wider use of AIS...
For a mid-size cruising sloop with a limited budget, where do you think dollars are best spent as far as electronics are concerned?
Alan
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Terrifically good radar and AIS have come way down in
price in the last few years.
AIS is the killer app for
collision avoidance, and if you sail anywhere where you might encounter
commercial traffic, in my opinion, AIS is a must-have. It's now so
cheap -- less than $600 for a black box transponder -- that it's hard to imagine why anyone would want to be without it.
I have been caught out in
fog without radar and I'll tell you, would not want to repeat that experience. Radar with guard zones set is a great enhancement of
safety and general situational awareness.
You can buy the excellent
Simrad NSS 7" MFD plus 3G radar for $2300 from Defender -- in my opinion, a crazy
price. So with AIS even including the extra
VHF antenna and so forth, less than $3000 if you install it yourself.
This deal is simply incredible:
http://www.defender.com/product.jsp?...cartId=4670709
Raymarine 7" MFD with radar including the cable. The Ray MFD has
WiFi built in. Only $1926, which is ridiculous, and several hundred cheaper than the comparable Simrad package.
At that price, I think few people would have an excuse to do without.
Garmin and
Raymarine offer similar deals for also excellent
equipment. The prices are simply crazy compared to four or five years ago.
Concerning electronics, is that all you need? If you were starting over from scratch, I would strongly suggest going to NMEA2000 which is easy to install yourself (saving you money) and infinitely expandable/upgradeable since there is much greater compatibility.
The aforementioned plotter/radar/AIS.
Then add N2K
wind instrument of your choice. An ultrasonic one is only $600 or so (I use the Maretron WSO-100 and recommend it).
N2K
depth and speed -- various choices.
Autopilot -- Simrad is top notch but there are other choices.
A good electronic
compass of your choice -- Maretron and Airmar are the obvious choices.
Instrument displays and pilot control -- you could use the
B&G Tritons for this, which are my favorites and what I use. You will want as many as you can find room for, because there are so many useful screens, but you could probably squeak by with two -- one for depth/speed, the other for
wind. You can use the MFD for pilot control, although a third Triton plus keypad at the
helm would be better. I have five Tritons on my
boat, and will install a sixth this
winter (not a budget
installation, but will give you some idea of how incredibly useful they are).
Garmin and Raymarine also make very nice instrument displays, and they can all be had for less than $500 each if you watch the sales.