Boat in build pics (2013 Fairline Squadron 78)

[jfm]

Do you have a sat compass? I'm using a Furuno ST50 which provides a boat heading (not COG) refresh rate of 40Hz - really smooth and necessary for MARPA/ARPA.

I don't Piers, and my feeling is I'm not missing much becuase i have no problem with Marpa as is. But maybe I don't know what I'm missing?

To be honest I was really keen on Furuno TZ and their guy "Dan" (now in the ads) tried to convince me at SIBS last year. I decided against it because Furuno refused to have screens showing engine and fuel data. Dan told me categorically that it was Furuno philosophy only to nav data and it was the engine maker's job to display fuel and engine data. I think that is bolx and told him so - in a big boat fuel management is a serious element of running a cruise, but he was adamant

So I rejected Furuno TZ and am going with something else

Then, would you believe it, Furuno introduced fuel and engine data screens on their TZ screens at LIBS this year! Too late for me I'm afraid, so they missed a 6-screen installation on my boat

 

[Piers]

I don't Piers, and my feeling is I'm not missing much becuase i have no problem with Marpa as is. But maybe I don't know what I'm missing?

To be honest I was really keen on Furuno TZ and their guy "Dan" (now in the ads) tried to convince me at SIBS last year. I decided against it because Furuno refused to have screens showing engine and fuel data. Dan told me categorically that it was Furuno philosophy only to nav data and it was the engine maker's job to display fuel and engine data. I think that is bolx and told him so - in a big boat fuel management is a serious element of running a cruise, but he was adamant

So I rejected Furuno TZ and am going with something else

Then, would you believe it, Furuno introduced fuel and engine data screens on their TZ screens at LIBS this year! Too late for me I'm afraid, so they missed a 6-screen installation on my boat

I know how yu feel. I didn't go for the TZ seriesmainly since I wanted a b;lack box suystem and to use Hatteland screens - hence I chose their Furuno nn3d (the precursor to the TZ, which I believe remains superioir as a nav system and more flexible).

The time you need boat heading and speed through the water for MARPA/ARPA is when the boat and target are being affected by tide and/or wind. Using these makes it as accurate as it can be. Errors come in if radar is fed with COG and SOG - and there's plenty on the web about this (sea-stabilised versus ground stabilised).

See you.

Piers

 

[jfm]

I know how yu feel. I didn't go for the TZ seriesmainly since I wanted a b;lack box suystem and to use Hatteland screens - hence I chose their Furuno nn3d (the precursor to the TZ, which I believe remains superioir as a nav system and more flexible).

The time you need boat heading and speed through the water for MARPA/ARPA is when the boat and target are being affected by tide and/or wind. Using these makes it as accurate as it can be. Errors come in if radar is fed with COG and SOG - and there's plenty on the web about this (sea-stabilised versus ground stabilised).

See you.

Piers

Thanks. I'll look into this some more. I can easily fit just the sat compass from furuno. I think the HDG refresh rate with Garmin is 10Hz and there is something in the manual about being able to set this to 20 if you want. I have 10Hz refresh of SOG and COG, whereas everything up to now has been 1Hz, and in the Med there is no tide so only wind would affect things, but there aint much of that either (it's lake boating realy )

Do you have some pics of your finished helm btw? Post on your refit thread sometime?
Best wishes

 

[Piers]

Thanks. I'll look into this some more. I can easily fit just the sat compass from furuno. I think the HDG refresh rate with Garmin is 10Hz and there is something in the manual about being able to set this to 20 if you want. I have 10Hz refresh of SOG and COG, whereas everything up to now has been 1Hz, and in the Med there is no tide so only wind would affect things, but there aint much of that either (it's lake boating realy )

Do you have some pics of your finished helm btw? Post on your refit thread sometime?
Best wishes

There's an 'Owners Upgrade' article coming out in MBY in the April issue which has pics and the full story of the upgrade (unless Hugo edits and chops the text!). It's due to hit the mag stands on 7th March.

BTW, the Furuno sat compass is a big beasty at some 2' diameter. It has 3 GPS sensors (to add to your collection), is accurate to 0.2 degree, and has a refresh rate of 40Hz. Either NMEA or AD10. Gives pitch and roll and turn rates and a whole bevy of other useful (useless?) info.

 

[jfm]

There's an 'Owners Upgrade' article coming out in MBY in the April issue which has pics and the full story of the upgrade (unless Hugo edits and chops the text!). It's due to hit the mag stands on 7th March.

BTW, the Furuno sat compass is a big beasty at some 2' diameter. It has 3 GPS sensors (to add to your collection), is accurate to 0.2 degree, and has a refresh rate of 40Hz. Either NMEA or AD10. Gives pitch and roll and turn rates and a whole bevy of other useful (useless?) info.

I think I'd better buy one just on principle then :-S
Looking forward to next month's mag with the Play D'Eau upgrades

 

[benjenbav]

Nope, and tbh I don't think it's that feasible unless someone knows how. All components on the network are viewable with their IP addresses on the screens, and should report errors. Any failed item can be unplugged (the connections twixt spurs/drop cables and the network backbone are all labelled and are not in random places). I carry spare network componensts ie backbone wires and T pieces, and I have a back up 2x power supplies to the network. Also I have a backup GPS mushroom because that's in an exterior location (though protected by dummy sat dome) so perhaps more likely to fail for that reason. And I have an independent N2K network and charting on the tender, plus the usual HH/iPad/laptop backups with loaded charts ie not reliant on internet for charting. And a compass or two. I reckon that's enough!

Also, paper charts, parallel rulers, dividers and stock of 2B pencils I expect. I think there's sufficient resilience in there.

Out of interest, do you have a sextant on board? I'm painstakingly and in a lapsed sort of way teaching myself astro nav, purely out of interest rather than expecting ever to need it.

 

[sarabande]

BJB - this looks like a fun app for jfm

http://happymagenta.com/spyglass/

 

[jfm]

Also, paper charts, parallel rulers, dividers and stock of 2B pencils I expect. I think there's sufficient resilience in there.

Out of interest, do you have a sextant on board? I'm painstakingly and in a lapsed sort of way teaching myself astro nav, purely out of interest rather than expecting ever to need it.

Oh yes, paper too. Forgot about those

Gotta admit I don't have a sextant. I did start the RYA astro course 10 years ago but didn't finish because it was weekday evenings and I ended up skipping sessions due to work. It was pretty tedious and I've forgotten it now, but you end up getting a "fix" to within 5 miles if you're good. I don't think learning this stuff is a good use of the time I have left on this planet and I'd really rather be boating The new boat will read both yankee GPS and the Russian satellites, so will fix to within 50millimetres or so

 

[pallalex]

Nope, and tbh I don't think it's that feasible unless someone knows how. All components on the network are viewable with their IP addresses on the screens, and should report errors. Any failed item can be unplugged (the connections twixt spurs/drop cables and the network backbone are all labelled and are not in random places). I carry spare network componensts ie backbone wires and T pieces, and I have a back up 2x power supplies to the network. Also I have a backup GPS mushroom because that's in an exterior location (though protected by dummy sat dome) so perhaps more likely to fail for that reason. And I have an independent N2K network and charting on the tender, plus the usual HH/iPad/laptop backups with loaded charts ie not reliant on internet for charting. And a compass or two. I reckon that's enough!

Wow you've certainly covered things. The only extra point I can add, is that in places where it is impossible to run another cable through post build, you run a spare that is blanked off. That way you can physically switch over if needed. We do this for backbones under floors where we know we cannot get to it again. It costs next to nothing to do during the build and can save your network if you get an issue (and of course if you are having a problem, you can switch over for testing to confirm that your first cable isn't the issue).

 

[jfm]

BJB - this looks like a fun app for jfm

http://happymagenta.com/spyglass/

I like that. Thanks

 

[jfm]

...places where it is impossible to run another cable through post build...

The boat has been built specifically so I can always run a cable from anywhere to anywhere. It is ram jam full of ducts with mice in them. Here is one of the mouse junctions, and there are several others like this around the boat. I can go from radar mast to anywhere, upper helm to anywhere. All cabins plus crew sspce aft and e/room are ducted to a junction near the lower helm, and so on...

 

[pallalex]

The boat has been built specifically so I can always run a cable from anywhere to anywhere.

Perfect

 

[scubaman]

+1. That is a fantastic arragement. Having spent quite a bit of time recently getting to know the wiring on my boat, I can so appreciate the benefits

 

[MapisM]

Gotta admit I don't have a sextant.
...
I don't think learning this stuff is a good use of the time I have left on this planet and I'd really rather be boating

Can't disagree with your conclusion, but!
Keeping a sextant onboard, together with a thick as a brick ephemerides book, has actually nothing to see with being able to use it.
It's sufficient to know the basic logic behind it, and any non-boater guest you might have onboard who would dare asking "what if all the electronic gadgets fail?" will regret having asked.
In fact, at that point, after saying seriously "Well, since you asked..." you will pull from a drawer your antique brass sextant, together with the book.
And you will explain how you would always be able to know where you are, just looking at celestial bodies and to your bible.
Granted to earn you a proper commander respect from the crew.
Oh, and if you're sure that nobody speaks Russian, you could as well pull from another drawer the cap below, and pretend that at the time you served in the former Soviet Navy as an infiltrator, there was no GPS around yet...

 

[Pinnacle]

P.......you need to hire a better make-up girl - this one isn't very good!

 

[Groot T]

I don't Piers, and my feeling is I'm not missing much becuase i have no problem with Marpa as is. But maybe I don't know what I'm missing?

To be honest I was really keen on Furuno TZ and their guy "Dan" (now in the ads) tried to convince me at SIBS last year. I decided against it because Furuno refused to have screens showing engine and fuel data. Dan told me categorically that it was Furuno philosophy only to nav data and it was the engine maker's job to display fuel and engine data. I think that is bolx and told him so - in a big boat fuel management is a serious element of running a cruise, but he was adamant

So I rejected Furuno TZ and am going with something else

Then, would you believe it, Furuno introduced fuel and engine data screens on their TZ screens at LIBS this year! Too late for me I'm afraid, so they missed a 6-screen installation on my boat

Shame, JFM. We should have spoken more about your nav setup at the time. The Hattelands have seven inputs, which means you can display the TZ Touch on one input, then change the input to select Engine data, then flip back as you need. Could have mimmiced that throughout the boat.

But no suprise at all that Furuno have introduced the Engine management info page...

However, milk & spilt. No drama, I do recall you saying you're going Garmin and will be substanitally less involved than Play D'eau. So definitely saved yourself a headache or seven there..!

 

[jfm]

Shame, JFM. We should have spoken more about your nav setup at the time. The Hattelands have seven inputs, which means you can display the TZ Touch on one input, then change the input to select Engine data, then flip back as you need. Could have mimmiced that throughout the boat.

But no suprise at all that Furuno have introduced the Engine management info page...

However, milk & spilt. No drama, I do recall you saying you're going Garmin and will be substanitally less involved than Play D'eau. So definitely saved yourself a headache or seven there..!

Seriously Toby, one of the problems with Hatteland is that customers (well, me at least) have no idea what they do and their website didn't help. "7 inputs" and "display the TZ touch" worries me - it makes it feel like a video screen/repeater. So I'd still need the TZ screen as well, or what? And what you describe, about flipping between nav and say engine data, throughout the boat, is avaialbe out of the box with Garmin. The Hatteland website offers screens and computers, but no information on how to build a nav system on a boat. The Garmin has loads more than 7 choices of what to display, has a brand that they wouldn't damage by offering something that worked clunkily, and I can play with it at a boatshow just to make sure it's ok, before spending thirty-five grand. Hatteland offers none of those things. I did look quite hard, but decided not to buy them due to lack of information on what the kit would actually do and a concern that I could spend a lot of money not knowing what I was getting and potentially making my boat hard to sell on the used market. I appreciate that detailed info might be available from a distributor such as you but no-one wants that in 2013. Folks want a website that tells them everything with diagrams of how the entire system plugs together. In my book no milk has been spilt

 

[Groot T]

Seriously Toby, one of the problems with Hatteland is that customers (well, me at least) have no idea what they do and their website didn't help. "7 inputs" and "display the TZ touch" worries me - it makes it feel like a video screen/repeater. So I'd still need the TZ screen as well, or what?

Hi JFM - very good point and thank you for making it. Sorry to hear the website wasn't all that useful and am now thinking of ways we can add to our Hatteland section on the website. So good feedback!

You are along the right lines of thinking that the Hatteland is another screen/repeater because, well, it is.

However, the beauty of black-box is that it turns a 'all-in-one' PC & Screen which rely on each other to function properly, into a PC which can be connected to ANY screen. So, suddenly, you have an extremely flexible setup which can be tailored to your needs.
With the TZ touch, you just have to make sure its a touch screen and the correct aspect ratio (16:10).

For example, At LIBS 2013, FURUNO were using a super-cheap touch screen (£400 or so) which did the job nicely. But you wouldn't want to put it in a marine environment.

The Garmin has loads more than 7 choices of what to display, has a brand that they wouldn't damage by offering something that worked clunkily, and I can play with it at a boatshow just to make sure it's ok, before spending thirty-five grand. Hatteland offers none of those things. I did look quite hard, but decided not to buy them due to lack of information on what the kit would actually do and a concern that I could spend a lot of money not knowing what I was getting and potentially making my boat hard to sell on the used market. I appreciate that detailed info might be available from a distributor such as you but no-one wants that in 2013. Folks want a website that tells them everything with diagrams of how the entire system plugs together

Thinking about what you've said, I need to put some work into doing a technical write-up on Play D'eau's nav upgrade. Discuss why each component was selected, how and why the system is plummed together the way it is and why the Hatteland Displays are such an excellent choice.

I must confess, a black-box setup for a 82 footer isn't uncommon, but it does depends on how in-depth the owner likes to get their Nav toys, err.., "I mean essential navigation equipment which the boat can't do without, honey". I believe that is the official line these days..? Right, guys?


Maybe this is something we can go over for, dare I say it, Match III ?

 

[Hurricane]

However, the beauty of black-box is that it turns a 'all-in-one' PC & Screen which rely on each other to function properly, into a PC which can be connected to ANY screen. So, suddenly, you have an extremely flexible setup which can be tailored to your needs.

I agree that a "black box" / "glass bridge" system is extremely flexible
I've been running one based on the Raymarine G series for five years and it is still as useful as the day it was installed.
I believe that my system is even more flexible than the one you have outlined.
All my PC nav kit etc runs in parallel to a standard Raymarine installation
I bet that 95% of skippers on this forum could use my kit with very little instruction
The core is essentially the same as a C series.
Everything is accessed using each individual display
One button does the Raymarin - one does the PC, one does the docking cameras etc.....

Really pleased with it
But it goes further than that - ANYTHING running on the PC is available on all the displays
I'm currently working on an anchor control which will "hook" up to the ship's internal LAN and by default is suddenly available throughout the boat

So, in principal, I agree with your comment about flexibility 100%

 

[Groot T]

I agree that a "black box" / "glass bridge" system is extremely flexible
I've been running one based on the Raymarine G series for five years and it is still as useful as the day it was installed.
I believe that my system is even more flexible than the one you have outlined.
All my PC nav kit etc runs in parallel to a standard Raymarine installation
I bet that 95% of skippers on this forum could use my kit with very little instruction
The core is essentially the same as a C series.
Everything is accessed using each individual display
One button does the Raymarin - one does the PC, one does the docking cameras etc.....

Really pleased with it
But it goes further than that - ANYTHING running on the PC is available on all the displays
I'm currently working on an anchor control which will "hook" up to the ship's internal LAN and by default is suddenly available throughout the boat

So, in principal, I agree with your comment about flexibility 100%

Completely agree, The Raymarine series is VERY easy to use. It is a superb choice!
A little secret.. Raymarine are now offering the Hatteland Displays in lue of their older G-series. Though it has been heavily adapted to work on their ethernet based system.

I am interested to find out about your Anchor control! Best of luck in getting it to communicate with your ships LAN.
Will you start a thread on it?