What is your primary means of navigation (poll)

[Siberian Sea]

Furuno chart plotter with C-map chart cards.

[Squanderbucks]

Being realistic and discounting the importance of electronic or other aids to navigation is being overly picky with semantics and misses the point. If eye only were the best form of “navigation” the ocean would not be filled with so many wrecks.
I understand your point but given the choice of paper, chronometer and a sextant or modern chartplotter system I think Captain Kidd and Horacio Nelson would jump all over the latter.
Nobody turns on their devices and buries their head in the sand.
I started with paper and ran to-from and around the Bahamas for several years. Can be done but — is it better. I don’t think so.
Then came LORAN then GPS crippled by Govt. then finally GPS unlocked. No comparison.

Garmin owns Navionics but their charts are different (appearance anyway). Many who fish can tell you the Navionics are much better at showing bottom contours. But the navigation portion is very similar. They just have a little different user interface. Things done on a Navionics iPad are easily ported over to the Garmin so allows the single use of having two different views

[purplesunrise]

If by "i-Boating" you meant TZ iBoat then my vote goes there. Of course I have several apps and find Navionics inadequate if you want your choice of NEMA data on the screen. Aquamaps tends to crash on iOS devices when AIS is turned on. Compared to TZ, our plotters are clunky but we still use them. In my opinion TZ iBoat is one of the gems that few boaters have heard about.

[requiem]

I voted for SEAiq, but I also keep a copy of OpenCPN around along with iSailor and Navionics on portables. Here's why:

In terms of functionality, OpenCPN is at the top, with SEAiq following, and all the others are pretty much left in the dust. If there was a GPS outage or the charts were improperly referenced I can use either of those two to navigate using traditional methods. However, I find the design of OpenCPN too kludgy and it doesn't run on my portable iDevices.

For the US where charts are free, I do planning on the laptop with SEAiq then export the routes and chart notes to my tablet and phone (which also run SEAiq). This gives me a common platform using official government charts that I can update as soon as NOAA pushes them out, and ensures that any danger bearings, comments from the local Notices to Mariners, etc. are present on each device.

As to presentation, I suggest looking at the "Boston Light beacon change" thread for an example of why I don't like Navionic's presentation. That, and the "scroll the chart, not the pointer" method for positioning the cursor is enough to put me completely off. If I want info on something I don't want to have to move the entire screen.

Overseas charts can be harder to find; while I can still purchase official ENCs to use with SEAiq, my fallback there would be OpenCPN and iSailor. iSailor's presentation is fairly decent in contrast to Navionics, and it runs on my portables.

[MJH]

Originally Posted by Duxa

Hi all, Im just now getting into sailing and do not have a boat. I am however going to be chartering some boats through my Yacht Club. Since these arent my boats I am not sure about the state of their navigational equipment (from ability to function to age of maps). So I am looking into various portable solutions for navigation.

I understand that OpenCPN is extremely popular; however there are a lot of other options out there and I am curious what everyone is using. Please also mention what device you use to run the software on. And what region you mostly sail in (as charts good in one locale may not be as good in another).

This is a little spreadsheet I made for my own notes as I am researching these:

I use Coastal Explorer on my nav station laptop here in the Pacific Northwest. The company (Rose Point Navigation Systems) is based in Redmond, Washington.

After planning the route I copy it directly into my Garmin GPSMAP 76CSx handheld via USB for use at the helm. This setup has work well for a roundtrip to Hawaii, Alaska, and numerous voyages into British Columbia.

~ ~ _/) ~ ~ MJH

[Adelie]

1. Eyeball/compass/waterproof atlas of local charts.
2. Handheld Garmin with native chart set for all of US.
3. Boats too small to bother with anything bigger. Next will be OpenCPN with a bunch of Raster charts I’ve already down loaded.

Depth data is always tenuous except in nearshore shipping channels.

[Kd9truck]

My primary systems, Navionics on chart plotter, navionics on the phone, local wind Windfinder pro, off shore predictwind.

[ranger58sb]

Originally Posted by Mike OReilly

Too bad you didn't set up the poll so multiple answers can be given. I think you'll find that most cruisers have at least two different nav tools.

Originally Posted by s/v Jedi

My eye balls are primary navigation aid.

Both good points.

Our typical navigation area is the Chesapeake Bay and the US East Coast.

We use, slightly in order of reliance:
- Mk I* eyeballs and nav aids
- Fixed plotter*
- sonar and radar augmentation
- AquaMap on a tablet, on the bridge
- primarily because of the optional USACE survey data
- TimeZero on a laptop
- primarily for planning and track capture
- iSailor on another tablet, on the bridge, sometimes
- MX Mariner on a tablet or phone on the bridge, sometimes
- Plan2Nav on a tablet on the bridge, only occasionally
- outdated/superceded app, but includes C-Map charts

* Previously we used a Furuno plotter with NOAA charts, with C-Map and Navionics charts optionally available. We've recently switched boats, and now have a Garmin GPSMap plotter with their G3 charts. We'll see how that goes... but I'm inclined to install a Furuno plotter along side, for more chart options.

-Chris

[Marathon1150]

[QUOTE=Mike OReilly;3488018]Too bad you didn't set up the poll so multiple answers can be given. I think you'll find that most cruisers have at least two different nav tools. In my case, I have three on board (four or five if you include iPhone plotter software).

Redundancy is always a good idea. We have on board:

1. Chartplotter at the helm with C-Map on one boat and Navionics on the second;
2. Paper charts for the waters we are navigating;
3. A laptop with OpenCPN and a variety of electronic charts and remote sensing images;
4. An iPad with iNavX and electronic charts from a variety of sources.
5. An iPhone X with iNavX and Navionics charts. This is the least useful of the above because the app runs very slowly.

[jfgy]

Hi folks.
I use Navionics that's updated annually on my plotter at the helm.
I also use Aqua Map that's updated much more frequently on a tablet at the helm when in frequently shoaling areas, etc.
Having that redundancy is important.
Regards,
Jess

[Stu Jackson]

Originally Posted by Duxa

I considered allowing multiple answers, but I feel like that would muddy the waters a bit. Even with multiple tools everyone got to have a favorite? .......................

Favorite? C'mon, this is supposed to be about technology, not girlfriends.

The reality is that you're asking a question just like, "Hey, mom, what girl should I marry, blonde, brunette or redhead?"

It makes no sense. There are now so many options out there that much of the final decisions are exactly NOT what other people are doing, or your mom, but what works for you. YOU, not me.

Some people swear by requiring a big screen at the helm. Me? I hate to look thru or around screens and am a proponent of "don't become a slave behind the wheel", and run my boat from in front of the wheel except for docking, and like Mike, use a handheld.

Some people are comfortable with phones, I don't have one! Heresy, I know, but what use is a phone to me where 90% of where I sail doesn't have a cell signal?

Some people like touch screens, others are, quite rightly I think, aghast at their poor performance in anything other than "nice & perfect" weather conditions.

And even if you go to buttons, some user interfaces are far superior to others. Which ones? Depends on what works for YOU, not me. Some folks like menus, others detest the concept. Which is why when this recurring question comes up, qualified respondents will suggest going into a store and try them out to see if they work for YOU, not me.

At least you have a nice list of stuff in your spreadsheet. While I haven't looked at in detail, I'll bet some skippers will point out a few you probably have missed. Like paper charts???...

Good luck, happy hunting.


PS - I sailed in & around SF from 1978 to 2016, when I sailed from there to BC up the coast. Garmin GPSMap 76Cx. Paper charts, too.

[cottonsail]

I have a Garmin chart plotter that I rarely use chart plotting. I mainly use it for displaying radar and the Panopix sonar. I use 2 ipads. One for AquaMaps for and the other for Navionics. AquaMaps for close up and Navionics for overall and ETA's. Additionally I have an old Garmin GPS also at the wheel as a backup. The Admiral is usually below monitoring things on a laptop GPS with AquaMaps. So asking in a survey what I use is difficult when you can only pick 1.

[Portage_bay]

I voted "other". On my personal boat I use Rose Point's Coastal Explorer. I like being able to pre-plan where every I feel like tackling the task. Not sitting in front of a hardware plotter. For backup I have on another laptop OpenCPN & Navionics. I am aware that Rose Point allows installation on 3 computers. However the boat came to me with a PC loaded with Coastal Explorer for which I am not the licensed owner and can't install on the backup PC. OpenCPN because it runs NOAA's freely available charts which I trust more than others. Navioncs because the subscription I use includes Canadian charts. I've also packed Navionics on a tablet when chartering in the BVI and delivering to Mx as backup to whaterve the boat has installed.

[geoff3nebel]

Paper charts and depth finder plus GPS. Radar in fog and reduced viz. Last year I bought a chart plotter with integrated AIS transponder and subscribed to Navionics, which I like, but I still keep updated paper charts on the nav station with position plotted every hour except during long offshore passages when it’s 0600 and 1800. I guess I’m old school

[ArmyDaveNY]

I prefer paper charts for planning and use while sailing, with a sextant for sailing when away from the coast. I use a Garmin handheld in the cockpit in case I need to confirm something. I have a Garmin at the nav station also.