NMEA 2000 instruments

[RestlessL]

I think I am going to part company with my NASA instruments this year. The last episode was the depth indicator showing "out" just as we were entering the marina at low water last Sat - I was only expecting 0.2m under the keels, so was not best pleased to go in blind. It was hard enough seeing the display due to condensation, and the speed had alreay packed in. And I don't even want to talk about the wind indicator.

A year ago I would probably have changed the units for Raymarine ST60s, but now I am considering the new multi-function displays, either Raymarine ST70s or Garmin GMI10s.

My question concerns the sensors. Presumably any NMEA 2000 sensor could be connected. Raymarine seems to stick with the existing ST60 sensors, but with a pod to convert to NMEA 2000. The range of Garmin transducers seems limited. The only other transducers I can find are the Maretron and Airmar ones (which seem to tbe the same). Are there any other NMEA 2000 transducers on the market, and does anyone have experience of them? I am looking in the first instance at speed, depth and wind.

Any advice appreciated.

John

 

[aluijten]

Generally spoken Raymarine themselves always uses Airmar sensors. The difference is now that the classic sensors are 'dumb' and simply put out a sensor signal. The new gen stuff holds the signalprocessing part in the sensor itself or in a separate black-box. The black box then connects to a instrument (or display) and the communication between the instrument and the sensor is digital.
I'd recommend to not go for sensors with integrated electronics, as they are much more expensive and still will fail in due time, making them expensive to replace. Using the black-box system is more versatile. Tacktick uses this approach as well (although I'm not sure if they are using NMEA 2000 already).