Best Handheld Charterplotter

[oceanfroggie]

As a backup to a marine plotter, an iPad. Needs a plastic cover slieve to make it waterproof and non slip.

It is also very good for tidal and weather apps, as well as email and web access for port info, skype, facetime, etc. Weather4D has excellent animated weather graphics. Otherwise a small Garmin handheld that uses AA batteries. Small screen but it can bounce if dropped! iPad tougher than you think but not bounceable.

 

[mcframe]

A Garmin etrex will run for 12 hours on a pair of AA cells - which have a shelf life of several years. Just one pack of four AA Duracells will give you up to 24 hours navigation for just a few pounds - when the first pair go flat, you just have to swap them out and you are back up and running in a couple of minutes.

That would still be my first choice for a backup - OK, I've got a very old eMap buried at back of the chart table (and a GpsMap60† with out-of-date charts, *and* a foretrex 401 for wrist-mounted, on-the-rail non-charts stuff).

iPad has charts for planning, but is mostly used on boat for watching movies.

Being able to *do* anything useful with the backup fix is a another matter - something like a Garmin 60 or 76 with OOD charts would at least give you an idea where safe water is rather than just a position.

Onna big-enough boat, I'd like a dedicated lat/long display at the chart table (could be DSC radio) and a Yeoman plotter....

†used for a couple of seasons before I fitted the SH 180

 

[LadyInBed]

Recently approached St Hellier, Jersey with seasick SWMBO in a F6 and using the inshore route at night. Obviously I was almost completely reliant on chartplotter.

Rather than a handheld chartplotter as backup, my advice would be to invest in a decent autohelm and link it to the chart plotter.

Pop in a WP and press GoTo
Press Track on the AH, then sit back and tend your sails and SWMBO

A handheld chartplotter wouldn't be much use to you if you had another 8 or 10 hour sail in front of you with a seasick SWMBO!

 

[Babylon]

Rather than a handheld chartplotter as backup, my advice would be to invest in a decent autohelm and link it to the chart plotter.

Pop in a WP and press GoTo
Press Track on the AH, then sit back and tend your sails and SWMBO

A handheld chartplotter wouldn't be much use to you if you had another 8 or 10 hour sail in front of you with a seasick SWMBO!

No, but it would radically de-stress the situation if his main systems went down for any reason (which was his original worry) and which would include everything linked to it, like the autohelm.

 

[Babylon]

I bought a Garmin GPS78s with a chart, and find it far to small screen to be any use.

I've got the Garmin GPS72CX or something with UK chart. I agree that the screen is tediously small, but as a backup to one's main system (in my case paper charts and a basic ship's GPS) it does the job of showing you where you are, especially if you're singlehanding in the cockpit. Its benefit is that it is compact, fully waterproof and robust.

I should have bought the same technology, but with a bigger screen, say:

https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?cID=161&pID=105624

but this would have been twice the money and at the time Force Four was doing a cracking deal on the old 72 with a free chart.

 

[Baggywrinkle]

There's a subtle piece of logic going on here - for me it goes like this ....

1. If I already had an iPad/Android tablet, I'd buy the Navionics app for it - no brainer - the device ends up on the boat anyway so it would be silly not to 'enable' the chart-plotter functions - but that would be it, no holder, no charging socket and the helm, no waterproof bag. There's no point sinking money into a device to overcome the fact that it is not fit for a certain purpose.

2. I wouldn't buy an iPad/Android tablet as an alternative to a cockpit mounted chart plotter - their intended environment is the coffee table, not the cockpit of a sailing yacht.

However, if I wanted an iPad/Android tablet anyway - for E-Mail, Movies, Internet etc. etc. then the occasional use as a fair-weather plotter would add more justification for the purchase, but once purchased then point 1 above would apply.

All IMHO

 

[LadyInBed]

My solution:

Articulated mounting bracket.

 

[Sailfree]

Rather than a handheld chartplotter as backup, my advice would be to invest in a decent autohelm and link it to the chart plotter.

Pop in a WP and press GoTo
Press Track on the AH, then sit back and tend your sails and SWMBO

A handheld chartplotter wouldn't be much use to you if you had another 8 or 10 hour sail in front of you with a seasick SWMBO!

Thanks but my major concern was risk of GPS receiver failing (I had this frequently on a previous boat due to water penetration until unit replaced). Boat is currently well equipped with Raymarine 120 at chartable and Navionics platinum chip, Raymarine 80? repeater at helm and Raymarine autohelm. There is also a 12V charging socket at chartable.

Have a separate Garmin GPS as backup which is switchable for position signal to DSC. Its a charter boat so good equipment attracts repeat bookings and I like to make it easy in case only one competent skipper on board! In my sailing bag I also have a handheld Garmin GPS but none of backup Garmins are chartplotter.

At one time I had critical waypoints say for the Swinge channel also programmed into the handheld Garmin but over the years have become completely dependant on chartplotter such that when making the turns on the inshore route with rocks all around me I realised I had no backup. It was raining and vis was poor. Its just an obvious risk I can eliminate for a few £100s so I want to do it. As buying an i pad for my business is a current consideration I thought I would throw the Q open to the Forum for the usual good advice.

As it is only going to be a backup and currently unlikely to be that for more than a couple of ocassions a year does make me lean to an i pad with a waterproof cover as that can be used for other things rest of year BUT mind not fixed yet. I don't like re-inventing the wheel and many on here would have been through a similar decision tree!

For any that think I am a safety freak I should add I commute 140mls every day into London on a motorcycle and keep up with the best, I also used to hang from a rope doing Tower block Structural Inspections. I believe though that I am only still around to do these things at my age by having lived my life with a policy of reducing unecessary risks.

 

[maby]

I certainly would not call you a safety freak - we all have a responsibility to take all reasonable precautions and I'm certainly aware that I have a tendency to put too much trust into the chart plotter.

We have two plotters fitted in the boat - an 8 inch at the helm and a 5 inch at the chart table, networked. We also have Navionics charts on my wife's iPad - used mostly for passage planning and finally a garmin eTrex in the locker with a pack of Duracells as a backstop.

We recently did a reasonably long passage and I became accutely aware part way through that I had no paper copy of the passage plan - if i had lost all the electrics, we could have had a few nervous moments. We were very careful before the return journey to write out the passage plan on paper and to plot it on paper charts.

 

[KREW2]

I know of someone selling an unused Raymarine RC400 including chart card for £250, posted. I was going to buy it but the timings not right. PM me if you would like his contact details.

The RC 400 is an excellent piece of kit. I sold mine with my last boat. What I liked about it was it can be wired into the boats electrics, or a cigar socket, it can be fitted with re-chargeable batteries, or ordinary batteries, with these you have to flick a switch to disable the charger.
The only thing it lacks is audio.