So tell us (me) how you use routes? Where are you sailing? Are you sailing or motoring?
How close are the waypoints or long / short are the legs of your routes?
My own experience with MFDs and 3 chart plotters... is that when sailing they are usually not useful.
First when sailing I usually have more than enough time to set a
single waypoint to sail to. If the
wind is favorable I can sail a course straight as an arrow with
GPS cross track and so on. I can see the course line and I can see the line from the starting location to the waypoint. My
instruments tell me the course to steer to waypoint and the course I am actually making. I am using an AP and make very slight adjustments to heading as needed.
Before I reach the waypoint I select the next one and repeat the process above. If I have to sail and tack or gybe my course made good with zig zag over the direct course line from start to way point.
What do I need to program a route? Why do I need to even have a library of way points? Is it too much trouble to enter one way point
destination at a time? Hell no!
I think these way point libraries and routes and all the "planning" that goes into them is just electronic makers
marketing useless features. There are likely better things to do with one's time then do route planning on a plotter.
Sure you should study your
charts and understand how to get from here to there... consider the
weather and how that will impact on your proposed journey.
I bought one of the first (and extremely expensive Trimble) plotters back in I think 1990 or so. And have had several since and never use routes or bother with waypoint libraries.
When I do set a way point it remains as an X on my C 80 plotter and I can use it again... and often do as I am mostly sailing in familiar southern NE waters.
Please tell me why you need and how you use routes?
+++
I now use a B&G T7 stand alone in the
cockpit... it shows me where I am heading... and that's more than enough information for me. More important is to maintain watch.
I don't bother manually
steering... Only do that when I must or conditions are so much fun that I want to play with the waves. The rest of the time... the AP drives the
boat and I do the thinking. And my AP is not
GPS driven either... I get a course from the plotter and I manually enter it into the AP and then make the minor corrections as needed. Sailing without an AP is crazy for me... not the least bit enjoyable. I've done it enough to know.
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