Navtex performance

[andf]

Anybody got any up to date experience of the relative performance of NASA Clipper and ICS Nav 6 Navtex units.

Our new boat has got a defunct Furuno and I miss the easily available weather forecasts.

 

[Guest]

Much better get yourself one that prints on paper!

 

[charles_reed]

For the price of the ICS you van get a Clipper Navtex AND a dedicated FTTY receiver for constant met forecasts, tuned to the german Met Office.

Outside of UK waters that's far more comprehensive as well as giving a longer horizon (5 days)

I can't comment on the performance of the ICS, but the Clipper is OK even if screen and fuseholders are cheap and cheerful.

 

[skipperneil]

I've used the ICS in my last two boats, they have a very strange menu system but their performance is very good. I have extended the aerial to give reception in areas of poor coverage with excellent results. The 6 Plus is also a data recorder logging position, etc as well as instrument repeater for attached NMEA instruments.
I have had a NASA unit in my first boat and the performance was rather dissapointing.
I have been alongside one boat that had NASA unit and didn't pick up anything while the ICS was working OK.

Of course you can always attach a serial printer to the ICS unit and the display is very much easier on the eye in the first instance.

Good luck!

Neil

 

[Guest]

I would seriously go for a paper one in preference to the ICS 6 etc.. Not sure if they're still made, but presumably pop up on Ebay etc.

Advantages are:

1) you can rip it off and take it into the cockpit while sailing. Saves all that fiddling with buttons and peering at small print down below in a blow. That means that you're much more likely to notice nav warnings about obstructions and gale warnings etc. while you're on passage than where you have to go below and flcik through menus.
2) you can interface it to your GPS and get print outs of your position every 15 mins, 30 mins or however often you want. Useful as a back up of exact last position in case GPS goes down.
3) you can Pritstick the position reports, weather forecasts etc. into your logbook as an exact record of where where you've been etc. It saves writing all that info down, which frees you up to use logbook as a record of more interesting info.

I've heard it said they cost a lot in paper - but I've only got through six rolls in six years of fairly intensive use. Cost has been about £4 per annum. If you consider that expensive, then you can source the paper cheaper if you want.

Performance of the ICS4 unit doesn't seem at all bad - I'm sitting in on the River Elbe in Cuxhaven at the moment and picking up forecasts etc from Cullercoats with no difficulty and few errors.

 

[BlueChip]

I have had both paper and video ICS Navtex units.

Based on my experience I would strongly recommend you don't go for paper. With the ICS LCD units you can set the display text size brightness and contrast to suit your eyesight and with these units you get far more than just Navtex, you also get a NMEA repeater with customisable display, a log history file for some months and Navtex history for several weeks. I leave the display showing the our position lat/long displayed in huge numerals, that way if anyone needs to give our position in an emergency, its immediately obvious.

New messages are always on top and you can scroll up and down messages and flip through the last three or four days forecasts to look at trends or to see which messages you haven't viewed
ICS Navtex performance is faultless, when interfaced with GPS it only displays relevant area messages but with GPS off or this feature disabled it will pick up messages from wherever it can.
I am in Haslar Marina with the antennae mounted on the lower pushpit rail but I can get messages from Norway and Northern Ireland.
Do go for the model which picks up both 490 and 518KHz messages automatically though.

 

[Nick_Pam]

I have an IC6+ at the nav table which also repeats course/autopilot/wind data from my Raymarine C80 Seatalk system....works beautifully both for these functions and also, of course, for the weather reports.

We get local Spanish language and French language reports on 490KHz and English language ones on 518KHz in Barcelona....we also get Niton (IOW) regularly!!!!!

 

[Billjratt]

ICS had acknowledged software problems a few years ago, this meant instances of ics units being "deaf" while neighbouring boats had clear reception. Also the paper was expensive. Probably (reading above) the fixes have been applied, but beware of older second-hand units. The nasa target, furuno and clipper units I have fitted over the years have all worked well, the trick being to keep the supply and aerial wiring away from interference.

 

[Guest]

[ QUOTE ]
Also the paper was expensive.

[/ QUOTE ]
As mentioned earlier, actually dirt cheap!

 

[richardwatson]

I had an ICS Nav 6+ fitted in 2003. The display was replaced three times under warranty for a combination of software issues, dead screens and lack of reception. The antenna was also replaced, twice, after filling with water. To get it to receive successfully the antenna needs to be at least a metre away from any other antenna and not enclosed within a closed loop i.e. shrouds. Mine is now on a tall pole on the transome. The last time I enquired, the dealer I bought it from no longer fitted this model, due to all the warranty claims, and was recommending Furuno instead. Eventually I got it to work well in the Med but as we now in the Caribbean where it has no reception, its just an expensive NMEA repeater.

 

[vande9389]

I have a ICS 6plus in my Hillyard. I bought it about 18 months ago or so - new(ICS not the Hillyard!). I did not buy the antenna, instead I bought the box that allows you to use an end fed wire antenna - in my case it is my main mast back stay. All I can say is that it has worked faultlessly. When the GPS is not on I pick up stations as far away from the Solent as the Dutch, German and Spanish stations with varying error rates.