Is EGNOS up and running ...

[petery]

The GPS aerial that came with my Raymarine kit is WAAS/EGNOS enabled. I believe that EGNOS is/was currently being trialled. Does any Raymarine user know how I can check if I am receiving an EGNOS corrected signal.

Of course, the extra accuracy won't make the slightest difference to the way I use the GPS - bit it would be nice to know.

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[Robin]

We have 2 WAAS/EGNOS GPS sets, one Navman 5500i plotter the other a Raymarine. The Navman can be switched from no differential to WAAS/EGNOS, the Raymarine has no controls other than via whatever display is used (in our case a Raytheon plotter). According to Raymarines instructions, their WAAS/EGNOS is currently turned 'off' internally on European sets until the system is up & running, THEN they will advise how to turn it on via the kit it is connected to. (I hope this applies to older plotters like mine too!). I have used the Navman with EGNOS 'on' (even tried it last weekend) and it IS working, but will periodically go off and sound an alarm because it is reverting to non-EGNOS because it isn't receiving, it will go back again when the signal reappears. It seems then that the system is almost there and is under test?? We leave our Navman with EGNOS disabled mostly, just to avoid the alarms, interestingly when we tried it yesterday it did move our position from sitting on the mud to back in our berth, correcting an error of about 25m at that time. It is supposed to be up and running this year I believe. The WAAS system of course is running OK but only in US area waters.



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[Oldhand]

Have a good read here: http://esamultimedia.esa.int/docs/egnos/estb/schedule.htm

Currently in a Solent marina I am receiveing EGNOS differential data intermittently from Satellite PRN 131. We are on the edge of this satellite's coverage and I expect that out in open water reception would be more reliable but I haven't bothered checking it while sailing. When test transmissions were using PRN 126, reception was more reliable.

My GPS is a Raymarine Raynav 300 and it is obviously enabled to receive and utilise EGNOS transmissions, as it has done so frequently since installation. It also allows the user to select 3 modes of operation, normal GPS, differential GPS with a suitable NMEA input and Satellite differentail.

If you have a PC which you can hook up to your NMEA bus, search for and download "VisualGPS". This allows a detailed view of what is going on with your GPS reception.

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[Robin]

I think we are all using the same Raymarine EGNOS receiver in the form of the aerial which contains the GPS/diff receiver, but you have a specific GPS display whereas we are connecting ours to a plotter that has no specific (in my case at least) control to switch between normal GPS, 'normal differential' and EGNOS differential. In our case Raymarine are supposed to advise a combination of key strokes to use which will enable the EGNOS choice to be selected once the system goes from test to full use.



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[Moose]

Does a WAAS aerial pick up EGNOS?

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[tome]

Yes, both WAAS(USA) and EGNOS(Europe) are Satellite Based Augmentation Systems (SBAS) and the set will work with any of these.

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[Wiggo]

Don't suppose anyone knows the magic keystrokes, then, do they?

<hr width=100% size=1><A target="_blank" HREF=http://homepage.ntlworld.com/graham.wignall/boats/eulimene600x800.jpg>The old and the new</A>

 

[Robin]

I have contacted Raymarine Support today and emailed them with the questions so if I get an answer in the 3 days they promise I will post it here.

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[Robin]

I said I would update my post once I had heard from Raymarine.

I have now received a reply from Raymarine who said that the WAAS part is already enabled IF of course you are in the area covered. The EGNOS part will be activated when the EGNOS system goes live, they say watch the Raymarine site for updates as there will be a series of key entries required to enable EGNOS on the Raystar120. Apparently my plotter which is an earlier version may also need a software update to do this.

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