Cobra DSC/GPS connector.

[jellylegs]

Hi, does anybody know where I can get the wire needed to connect my Lowrance GPS/plotter to my Cobra VHF radio, please? I saw an old thread from last year but he was upgrading from this set-up so therefore was only useful in that it proved it is possible.
Any help much appreciated.

 

[pvb]

You haven't said which Cobra radio you have, but I think the GPS cable is common. You can get one from this page at JG Tech. However, £19 is a lot for a simple cable. I think the cable is just a 2-core wire on a 3.5mm jack plug, so if you're handy you could make one for much less.

 

[planteater]

You haven't said which Cobra radio you have, but I think the GPS cable is common. You can get one from this page at JG Tech. However, £19 is a lot for a simple cable. I think the cable is just a 2-core wire on a 3.5mm jack plug, so if you're handy you could make one for much less.

If making your own cable you need a very thin 3.5mm plug. The metal ones from Maplin are OK but the plastic ones are too "fat" to fit into the moulded recess on the back of a MR55.

 

[bitbaltic]

My MRF55 (UK/EU version) has a 2.5mm jack for the GPS connection and a 3.5mm jack adjacent to it for the external cockpit speaker. Helpfully, in both the UK and US manuals (US version here) the arrows indicating which jack is which are labelled the wrong way round. This caused a lot of confusion when I bought the boat- the previous owner had made up a 2.5mm jack on the external speaker lead and, following the instructions, dutifully bunged it into the GPS socket. The 2.5mm jack on the GPS lead (the original Cobra one) obviously wouldn't stay put in the 3.5mm speaker socket so disappeared down behind some lockers. This whole setup can never have worked for the previous owner and took me quite some time to sort it out- initially I thought the set had not actually been wired in, until I went hunting around behind the lockers.

So if you are going to make up a lead (it is just two wires to a mono jack as there is no earth) you need a 2.5mm not 3.5mm jack I think.

My local marine engineers (Wigmore Wright in Penarth, http://www.wigmorewrightmarine.co.uk/) were able to source another original Cobra lead so you could give them a try or ask your local engineers. However it cost about as much as advertised in the link above......