NASA Navtex aerials

[discovery2]

Over recent months here have been some postings that NASA navtex aerials are liable to suffer some ingress of water, and some forumites have advised sealing the aerial. Having just purchased a navtex, I am unable to separate the cover from the base to seal it (despite removing the small screw).

For those who have sealed the base of the aerial, is it simply a case of spreading some sealant around the outside of the join at the base? Or could NASA have recently modified the seal at the aerial base?

Thanks for any help
David

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[charles_reed]

Re: NASA Navtex aerials and show prices

NASA have changed the active aerial design.

The earlier one was a whip aerial going onto a box, containing the PCB, with a flat plate with 8 machine screws on it. This plate was the one that needed sealant around it. Tony Klcher assured me that the new design, was waterproof.

Incidentally the 2 instruments, Clipper Navtex and Weatherman, as off-show stand items came to £280

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[milltech]

Re: NASA Navtex aerials and show prices

Was that a Sunday afternoon demo disposal sale?


<hr width=100% size=1>John
<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.allgadgets.co.uk>http://www.allgadgets.co.uk</A>

 

[charles_reed]

Re: NASA Navtex aerials and show prices

Yep.

Besides I have done some extended tests for them.

It's a bit of a bind having to be there at 17.30.

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[steve_cronin]

DON\'T....

...seal around the bottom. This is a sure way to hold water in if it gets in - which it will. There is. as you can see a join around the top cap. Sealing this with white self amalgamating tape is a wise precaution if you intend to site the antenna outside. Mine works perfectly well in a saloon locker. Some people site theirs at the rear of a stern cabin. Remember,this is long wave radio technology which doesn't require line of sight to the transmitter.

As Charles says the old aerials used to leak because they were of a rubbish low cost design (Charles didn't add the last bit, I DID) I had one of the first which had a CRT video display drawing around 5amps in display mode and >1amp in standby. It also needed interchangeable cards to change nav areas. The aerial was a telescopic whip a la "cheap trannie" atop a black box with an unprotected PCB board and if sited outside both the box and the aerial would corrode internally the latter shedding itself section by section over a season (that is if someone hadn't snapped it off sooner). This was later replaced by the solid tapered stainless whip held into a brass boss by a mild steel grub screw - Genius design and combination of dissimilar metals for a salt environment and when the whip came loose, you couldn't tighten the grubscrew as it had rusted almost away! However it worked well enough "with the wind in it's favour" and got us home through a weather window many a time.

I have always had at least one NASA product on all my boats. Currently we have a Clipper Navtex and are just about to fit one of their HP3/M SSB receiver for Weatherfax via an ancient laptop.

Now the point I can never understand about NASA is that they just won't move with the times and move just a little up market. Now that Raymarine are in the stratosphere as far as price is concerned for indifferent merchandise, I would have thought that there was room for our native electronics proponents to fill the gap before more Us and Kiwi firms rush in.Even the boss of NASA admitted to me at the show that the software they provide for Weatherfax is inferior to other freeware programs readily available and recommended that I get hold of VF32 (or somesuch) which would remove the double imaging I am experiencing and dump his supplied "Tarfax".

Their manuals must also be the worst on the market. (Basic hand drawings and thin lasercard covers abound.) Especially, they leave paragraphs in that refer to features they have previously deleted from the product or change a feature and don't give information about the change. Mr "NASA" readily admitted to this with the comment "... well we do make entry level equipment, don't we?" Shades of Gerald Ratner or is this man bent upon remaining architepally British?

Steve Cronin

<hr width=100% size=1>The above is, like any other post here, only a personal opinion

 

[Rabbie]

Completely agree .........

He also COMPLETELY ignores repeated letters of complaint about service!.




<hr width=100% size=1>A day not spent on my boat is a day in my life wasted.

 

[philmarks]

Re: Completely agree .........

Their approach defeats me as well. No web site. Are they a high tech company or what? Basic advertising. It's one thing to be entry level, and another thing to be blind about the company's strengths and trade effectively on them (of course they may well think that they do).

<hr width=100% size=1>Rgds
Phil

 

[discovery2]

Thanks for your comments, they have been helpful.

NASA do have a web site: www.nasamarine.com from where product manuals can also be downloaded.

David

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[milltech]

Re: Completely DIS-agree .........

I would like to step in and disagree. Nobody doubts that Nasa could be better communicators, and I know, I worked there. However the Nasa ethos of combining brilliant innovation and designing-in only the essential features, down to a price, with an absolute and total regard for cost saving at all stages of production and sales, has served them and their yachting customers very well over the years being both profitable and delivering low cost instrumentation.

Taking one part of that ethos and making it different to the others would be watering down the mix and misunderstanding the driving force at Nasa, which is one mans drive to keep down cost and that same man's brilliant innovation. The point is that the approach is universal at Nasa so the instruction manuals might not be great, but they are understandable. Likewise there is now a web site www.nasamarine.com, and it is frankly amateur-hour, but it is a web site, has much useful information on it, and I'm sure it was put up free of external cost!

The old CRT Navtex looks today like something from the ark, but remember Nasa were the first producers of Navtex for yachtsmen, years ahead of the rest. One is tempted to admire the others with their grand boat show stands and heavy advertising budgets, but Nasa has been responsible for it's own share of genius and innovation too.

These pages often contain complaints about the high cost of boating, in my view 100% correct, lets not have a go at just about the one company in the UK marine industry that strives to achieve the opposite with visible success.

<hr width=100% size=1>John
<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.allgadgets.co.uk>http://www.allgadgets.co.uk</A>

 

[steve_cronin]

Valid comment and position but....

...the sales of the original VW beetle surged when they decided to replace the canvas sling seats with proper upholstery. Then ther was the case of Skoda; they realised that they would go the way of Wartburg and Lada unless they switched from making motorised skips, the Octavia being much more of a car, without their abandoning their "value for money" ethic.

Nasa don't need to emulate Raytheon (Heavens above!) but just a little modernisation and smartening up would be appropriate don't you think?

Steve Cronin

(one of many who's patronage paid your wages when you were there)

<hr width=100% size=1>The above is, like any other post here, only a personal opinion

 

[charles_reed]

One thing, I\'m sure you\'ll agree

about Steve is their insouciant honesty.
They show such a charmingly Brit trait - a simple, reasonably designed bit of kit with some obvious and glaring fault.

Reminds me of a naval architect of our acquaintance - you always look for his deliberate mistake before you take the boat offshore.

At least with NASA you have the triumph of discovering and correcting theirs.


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[charles_reed]

You have my support here

From early Doppler log to their latest range of instruments they've had an unbroken record of innovation and all at a very affordable prices.

Their marketing is highly cost-effective and they spot and rapidly exploit market niches that many ignore.
Considering the size of the firm they really put themselves about and I wish that 10% of UK marine firms were as effective as they are.

James and his lot in Margate were an equally effective force until they had the misfortune to fall into the hands of a moribund Norwegian international company.
The last lot of instruments (Corus) they produced were streets ahead of anything else on the market even now - OK they had their little idiosyncrasies, like unstable lens coating.


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[celandine]

I have had four different Nasa instruments over the years, and they hardly make it into a second season. I had the Navtex Pro which suffered partial failure of the display which I tried to live with until it packed up completely - the aerial (old type) was full of water and u/s. I made the mistake of letting Nasa talk me into a discounted replacement with their latest Navtex Pro Plus. This arrived with a manual that made no mention of the new dual frequency capability, and with the wrong code for Niton, even though this had been changed 12 months earlier. They had only changed the cover of the old manual. I asked them why they omitted the extra sheet of A4 that would have made all clear, and they could not say why. I would never buy a Nasa instrument again. To have no instrument is safer than having one that lets you down.

Mick

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[charles_reed]

My experience has been totally different

I've had a number (6) of NASA instruments over a period of 32 years.
Providing one susses out the weakness in each and moves to rectify it before fitting all the instruments have given good service. This doesn't mean to say that they've all worked first time every time - if you were the National Aeronautic and Space Administration you should perhaps expect such service and pay top $ for it.
I've even found their after-sales service adequate, providing you nag them.

If of course you wish to have everything done for you and have no responsibilities for the equipment malfunctioning then NASA are not for you. You must find companies that will charge you 40% more for equipment which is probably little more "fit for purpose".

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[steve_cronin]

Piont is Charles, old boy,...

YOU appear to be content with mediocrity for your money, the above gentleman and a lot more of us aren't

AND I put up with the idiosyncracies of driving an MG Midget (well 2 actually) like having to get out, open the bonnet and turn off a bibcock to put the heater on cold., However they are both 30 years old. If it was the case with a NEW car it would be unacceptable, don't you think?

Steve Cronin


<hr width=100% size=1>The above is, like any other post here, only a personal opinion

 

[charles_reed]

You get what you pay for

it's somewhat illogical to expect to get a Rolls Royce for the price of a Lada. (so to speak)

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[halcyon]

Re: Piont is Charles, old boy,...

I remember that valve, now wonder how I used to get into the Midget !!!!!

Brian

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[steve_cronin]

Nobody\'s suggesting..

.. a move from one end of the spectrum to the other but just a slight shift in the interests of progress might not be bad, eh?

You know, the only two cars I've ever had that broke down were a Rolls Royce and a BMW. The Rolls outside a textile factory disgorging it's young female workers on Chrismas eve with me dressed as Santa (& only my underwear under the suit) driving it. The BMW in my own driveway.

Steve Cronin



<hr width=100% size=1>The above is, like any other post here, only a personal opinion