What brand of marine instruments

[cburger]

I need to install new speed and depth gauge and Radar. The Navico Brand was a real disappointment. Have heard Raymarine not what they used to be. So wondering what brand of marine electronics members have had success with?

[tkeithlu]

This is a matter of personal preference and experience. I happen to like Garmin in most cases, but run a Simrad autopilot, Furuno radar, and Chinese AIS. My prejudice is against integrated systems. I run a separate antenna and module for each, rather than integrating them into a single brand single glass cockpit. I know that I have the space on my instrument panel to do that, and many sailors do not, but hate the thought of a single element (smoke from burning insulation, monitor goes "ping") leaving me with no plan B. If you lose the GPS, it's awfully nice to have the paper chart, radar, AIS GPS, and depth sounder still working for you.

[Wotname]

I like Furuno (but can't always afford them ) and after that, Garmin.
I have found Furuno stuff to be bulletproof.

[Bruce K]

Have a look at what your local professional fishermen use; here it's mostly Furuno or Koden, that's what I use, simple to use, rugged and reliable (also expensive;for a reason) The only downside is they don't carry on with coloured flashing lights and things that go "beep beep" like an arcade game. I find that about 90% of people don't really know how to use their instruments, they are there simply to impress others.

[boatpoker]

Sharon and I deliver powerboats between Lake Superior and Antigua so we have run just about every piece of electronics on the market. I will not buy Raymarine because there are hiundreds of useless features and all the needed features buried and a mess of layered menus. You can't run this stuff without their poorly written manuals right there at the instruments.

[apirate]

Personally I'm a fan of Raymarine. It's still solid stuff.

[Tillsbury]

I still like raymarine for the basics, both performance and aesthetics wise. The new fancy stuff seems a bit of a waste for most purposes when you want speed, depth, wind to have their own displays that are always in one place. For chartplotting/ais and fancy stuff I prefer to go with IPads as they are so much better value and have other uses, as well as higher resolution displays. And they mean that an iPhone is an instant emergency substitute. I do have a small raymarine a-series chartplotter as a secondary device but mostly for use as a radar display. Redundancy and simplicity, with many solutions for basic gps/chartplotter in case of failure in any or multiple devices.

[James S]

Furuno radar... simrad autopilot and the rest.. no chart plotter at this time..

[FabioC]

I am using 100% B&G, including the 4G radar. Very poor user interface, lousy manual. The problem is that these things are so expensive and require so much tuning/customization in the installation that once you have them, you are stuck with them for the foreseeable future.

[rms95835]

My only experience is with Raymarine, as that is what the boat we purchased came with. That said, I’ve had a couple of opportunities to contact them and have been very pleased with their support. Short wait times, good answers, and easy to understand people on the other end of the line. I have a friend who just bought all new B&G instruments, and has nothing good at all to say about their tech support. You might want to make a short list, and call each companies tech support to gauge how they respond. I don’t care what you buy, seems there will always be an opportunity to solve, so from my perspective this is an important part of the purchase decision.

[CHRIS V CLEMENT]

I have 100% Garmin - including hydraulic auto pilot, wireless wind transducer, GPS display, auto pilot display, and two multi control displays. Other sensors are airmar depth - paddlewheel, Garmin fluxgate compass, and Garmin GPS. All of these devices speak to each other through 4 common wires. This was the original COMNAV or NEXUS system that Garmin purchased. It is easy to install, trouble shoot, and repair, if needed...

[MAJICDAN]

I use what the US Army uses: GARMIN

[rickdamico]

I was honored to go on an underway in a US Navy Fast Attack Nuclear Submarine not too long ago, and I immediately noticed a Furuno radar dome on the bridge when traveling above the surface. Must be pretty good.

My last boat had all Raymarine and in 12 years, there was never a problem.

In my current boat I have all B&G, and it's taking some time getting to know it, but no problems after one year.

Rick D'Amico

[Jannie Radiance]

I am the Garminator!!!!Garmin Garmin Garmin

[Siberian Sea]

I own a commercial fishing vessel in Alaska and here the industry standard is Furuno. When it came time for electronics on the sailboat I opted to stay 100% Furuno except Icom for VHF radios. Never had a problem with Furuno.