Integrated instrument package

[Guest]

Hi there,
I'm currently looking at buying a complete integrated instrument package for a 30ft wooden cutter. Does anyone have any recommendations or don'ts!! I am looking at, Simrad IS15, Raymarine ST60, Brookes and Gatehouse, Cetrek CNET 2000. I especially like the ability to display GPS 'rolling road' of the cetrek, but haven't heard anything about their reliability.

All comments and advice gratefully received. I'm looking for Wind, Speed, Depth, Nav (gps) in cockpit and a couple of multi function instruments at the chart table, which I can display anything I choose.

Many thanks in advance all help appreciated
Colin W.
Possum
Upper Thames

 

[Avalon]

Hi

Sounds like a fairly elaborate instument package for a 30 ft wooden cutter....

I chose Cetrek C-net 2000 for a variety of reasons:

Firstly, you can display up to 4 pieces of information on a single instrument at the same time - such as speed, depth, rolling road and COG/SOG. I also like the ability to display historical data as a graph - be it speed, depth, water temperature or battery voltage.

Secondly, I like the fact that Cetrek use standard NMEA rather than a proprietary data format. Each instrument has (I think) 3 NMEA inputs and one output. In addition there is a high-speed Canbus link to share data between instruments. Thus I can feed the GPS data to a Cetrek instrument, and take outputs to the autohelm, radar and laptop-based chart plotter.

I bought the instuments a couple of years ago and have had no problems. I still think they represent the state of the art.

One potential problem is the lack of worldwide service backup.


Phaon Reid, S/Y Avalon of Arne
www.sailingontheweb.com

 

[Twister_Ken]

Raymarine has its own protocol (Sea Talk I think) which is a slight problem if you ever want to plumb in a bit of someone else's kit. OTOH, it's delightfully simple to daisy chain the instruments together - child's play.

 

[tjc]

Go for the Simrad, I have just bought the IS12, good kit and they were ever so helpful on their stand at the LIBS. NMEA compatible too. Could not afford the IS15 though.

Raymarine is good but not if you want to plumb some other kit into it. Ties you in which is what they want. A friend has their full package and has a lot of problems of a minor nature, just irritating basically.

Can't speak for the others though.

 

[colin_jones]

They are all pretty good.

I have had C-Net 2000 for 3 trouble free years. Expensive, getting cheaper, but very reliable and very versatile. I like the way in which I can make any display be what I want - log, sounder, gps info, averages, all of these on one screen, etc and that I can have a 2d display of seabed etc. If you wear reading glasses, the big digit possibility is excellent. The wind instrument is also good.

I have tried out Cetrek's claim that they can up-date and even repair instruments via email. It works.

Beofre indulging, I should telephone the company about its distribution arrangements now that Sowester is RIP. It should al be OK, but I should want some assurance on this.

 

[billmacfarlane]

I use Raymarine and it's not that difficult to use other manufacturers kit with it. I've got the ST60 package with Radar/Chartplotter linked to Furuno GPS and Navtex. Raymarine have a good reputation for after sales support but I haven't tried it yet , hopefully I'll never have to.

 

[Guest]

Thanks For this, I'm leaning towards Cetrek as well, however I now need to find a supplier.
thanks
Colin
East Coast UK/Thames

 

[Guest]

Thanks for all the replies, I think I'm going to go for the Cetrek, if I can find a UK supplier.
Many thanks for your replies, I'll let you know how I get on.
Colin

 

[colin_jones]

Cetrek equipment is now distributed by Aquamarine of Eastleigh. Tel 02380 694949. If you call this number, the sales people will tell you where to find the most convenient agents.

 

[extravert]

Another endorsement of Cetrek. I replaced nearly the whole system on a 10m racing yacht with an integrated Cetrek system 2 years ago. The NMEA input/outputs of each display unit allowed me to keep some of my old system, namely the compass sensor and the mast displays, which were (and still are) working perfectly. This saved me a whopping £2000.

Because one display can display everything, even simultaneously, I wired up my system to have a minimum power configuration where there is only 1 display out of 4 and the depth/log/wind transducers working. This is a real help on long legs of races where electrical power is getting low and starting the engine is not really an option. I've had no reliability problems since their installation.