B&G Vulcan lost its Laylines

Norman_E

Norman_E

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The laylines are one of the most useful features on the Vulcan chartplotter. Yesterday in cleaning the screen I accidentally switched it back on and did some sort of reset. Today I have managed to get the chart display back the way I want it, except that no red and green laylines are shown. In Settings, Charts, Laylines they are turned on as is "always show boat laylines", yet nothing appears. I have tried turning them off, switching off the plotter and turning back on then turning laylines on again, but nothing appears.

Anyone have an answer to this problem?

EDIT: I have checked that the plotter is receiving wind data.
 
Norman_E said:
The laylines are one of the most useful features on the Vulcan chartplotter. Yesterday in cleaning the screen I accidentally switched it back on and did some sort of reset. Today I have managed to get the chart display back the way I want it, except that no red and green laylines are shown. In Settings, Charts, Laylines they are turned on as is "always show boat laylines", yet nothing appears. I have tried turning them off, switching off the plotter and turning back on then turning laylines on again, but nothing appears.

Anyone have an answer to this problem?

EDIT: I have checked that the plotter is receiving wind data.
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Mine is exactly the same. I’ve never been able to see laylines despite all the settings saying they are displayed. I’d love to know how to make them visible.
 
MikeCC said:
Is STW also being received OK?
Click to expand...

STW is not a term I recognise. The plotter is getting apparent wind angle and speed from an NMEA0183 to NMEA2000 gateway and I presume this sends the data as PGN 130303. True wind direction and speed are calculated by the B&G Triton instruments using boat speed from the log and fed into the NMEA2000 network so that either the Tritons or the plotter can use the data.. My best guess is that the reset has changed which data sources are being used, but so far I cannot see anything different or incorrect. The boat is currently docked, not sailing until tomorrow, but it should still show laylines as they are just a function of boat position, cursor position, and true wind direction, and the boat symbol is accurately positioned on the chart.
 
If the boat is very still in a marina berth then laylines don't always appear... the system doesn't for example know if you're about to head upwind or downwind...

I've found it difficult demonstrating the sailsteer / layline display unless we're actually out sailing.
 
I did wonder if being stationary was an issue, but the laylines were lost when I was in our previous bay and did not appear at all when sailing here. I go sailing again tomorrow, having tried to get it working whilst here, so we shall see.
 
Now its gone completely crazy. I had the C-map chart displayed like a paper chart with the land yellow and the sea shaded just like a paper chart. Now that has vanished leaving me with sea shaded blue and land shaded green, both so dark as to almost unusable in sunlight. All the chart detail of depths, danger marks etc has gone and no amount of searching through onscreen menus will change it back. I even tried a factory reset of the whole system, to no avail. As it stands it has just become useless.

EDIT: The only good side today was some decent wind that had my old boat going at 9 knots for a while.
 
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And now it is fixed. Nothing to do with the Vulcan, and all the searching through the Vulcan menus with considerable help from B&G was a waste of time. The fix was to go into the menus of one of the Triton instruments instead, select Setup - Advanced - and select "Use COG as heading".
 
Norman_E said:
And now it is fixed. Nothing to do with the Vulcan, and all the searching through the Vulcan menus with considerable help from B&G was a waste of time. The fix was to go into the menus of one of the Triton instruments instead, select Setup - Advanced - and select "Use COG as heading".
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Thanks for the follow up. Surprising, but good to know!
 
Norman_E said:
And now it is fixed. Nothing to do with the Vulcan, and all the searching through the Vulcan menus with considerable help from B&G was a waste of time. The fix was to go into the menus of one of the Triton instruments instead, select Setup - Advanced - and select "Use COG as heading".
Click to expand...
I haven’t got Triton instruments, but Raymarine ST50s on a Seatalk network. They feed a miniplex that runs the N2K network, of which the Vulcan is a member.

I’d like to understand just what it was that got your system to display laylines, to see if I can identify a similar fix in my own setup. Interested to find out how you discovered COG as heading was the solution, and what kind of Triton instrument held the key?
 
Do you not have a heading sensor (electronic compass) on the network, or do you have one and perhaps it has stopped sending heading information?

I would expect more accurate layline predictions with heading sensor input as well as wind, GPS and speed through water input.
 
I do! I’ve never looked into whether it is giving COG or not, as the various GPS devices are all set to do this.

Good shout. Thanks.
 
KAL, I was hoping you were going to say that your heading sensor outputs the equivalent of HDG i.e. the way the hull is actually pointing rather than the course you end up going over the ground COG.
The plotter needs to compare 'Boatspeed and Heading' with 'Speed Over Ground and Course Over Ground' to calculate Tide Rate & Direction. Only when it's calculated this can it give you the most accurate laylines. A strong tide can make a world of a difference.
 
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Just to add... setting 'Use COG as heading' is a workaround that allows the calculations to be made but if you have real heading data available then it's preferable to use it.
 
Martin_J said:
KAL, I was hoping you were going to say that your heading sensor outputs the equivalent of HDG i.e. the way the hull is actually pointing rather than the course you end up going over the ground COG.
The plotter needs to compare 'Boatspeed and Heading' with 'Speed Over Ground and Course Over Ground' to calculate Tide Rate & Direction. Only when it's calculated this can it give you the most accurate laylines. A strong tide can make a world of a difference.
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I believe the electronic compass does output HDG. What I don’t understand is why the Vulcan, which works in every other respect and has all the “boxes ticked” to show laylines....still doesn’t. I often sail without my log impeller in place, but even when I do insert it, the laylines are conspicuously absent, so it can’t have anything to do with that.
 
I know this is an old thread, but the problem still persists. I have spent many hours over the winter trying to get my tacking laylines (port and starboard) back on the screen with my B&G Vulcan and have consistently failed until today. This is how you do it. First save all your waypoints and routes to the SD card in the MFD. Then do a device (factory) reset. Now Auto Select the data sources. Then reboot (cold start). Your tacking laylines should finally be restored. Lastly, check that all the displayed data is set up on the screens how you like to see it. Job done!
 
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