Raymarine ST60 Multi - does NMEA get passed to Seatalk

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Chiliblue

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I am a little further with my refit, all instruments, vhf and plotter installed but...

I am using a VHF with built in GPS (Standard Horizon 1700e) I have the nmea out from them wired up to my ST60 Multi and it happily displays the NMEA data.

The seatalk circuit goes out form the Multi thru a Tridate and Wind ST60+ and on to my RL70 Plus.

The NMEA positioning data isn't appearing on the RL70 Plus plotter!

I can of course simply wire the NMEA out from the ST60 Multi to the NMEA in on the Plotter... but I thought the ST60 transimited the nmea data over seatalk.

If anyone as the same setup can they let me know how they have theirs wired up?

Many thanks

Chiliblue
 
Do I understand your post correctly? NMEA does not go over the Raymarine Seatalk wiring. ST60 instruments that are also NMEA capable have those input/ output connections physically separate from the seatalk connections.
 
earlybird said:
NMEA does not go over the Raymarine Seatalk wiring. ST60 instruments that are also NMEA capable have those input/ output connections physically separate from the seatalk connections.
Click to expand...

Yes, but some of them also convert data on the NMEA input to its Seatalk equivalent and output it to the bus.

From my readings here it does seem to be a bit random exactly what each particular model does in this regard.

Pete
 
Hi,

Just to be clear that I am not creatively splicing nmea cable to seatalk.

The multi has 4 input/outputs.

2x seatalk 3 pole connections. In my case one introduces 12v to the unit and seatalk circuit, the other is wired to the tridata then wind, then on to the plotter.

1x NMEA IN 2 pole connection which is connected to my nmea gps (the one built in to my DSC VHF)

1x NMEA OUT 2 pole connection (currently not connected)

I thought the Multi passed certain NMEA sentences and passed/translated them to seatalk - that's what the manual indicates but a quick search on the internet throws up a lot of confusion.

Worst case I can wire the NMEA in on the plotter to the NMEA out on the multi and that should work it would just be neater if I didn't have to do that.
 
Apologies, I misinterpreted your phrase "transmitted NMEA over seatalk". Yes, I would expect NMEA GPS position data to be converted onto Seatalk, but I can't suggest why it isn't. My Graphic, similar to a Multi, does that from my Furuno GPS.
 
From the ST60 Multi Manual

"NMEA to SeaTalk
The ST60 Multi instrument decodes certain data from NMEA when available, and
if the respective data is not already present on SeaTalk, transmits the decoded
data to SeaTalk."

According to the Plotter manual it should take the positioning data from the Seatalk if present.

Sort of answering myself here, only that is not what is happen on the boat.
 
Chiliblue said:
I am a little further with my refit, all instruments, vhf and plotter installed but...

I am using a VHF with built in GPS (Standard Horizon 1700e) I have the nmea out from them wired up to my ST60 Multi and it happily displays the NMEA data.

The seatalk circuit goes out form the Multi thru a Tridate and Wind ST60+ and on to my RL70 Plus.

The NMEA positioning data isn't appearing on the RL70 Plus plotter!

I can of course simply wire the NMEA out from the ST60 Multi to the NMEA in on the Plotter... but I thought the ST60 transimited the nmea data over seatalk.

If anyone as the same setup can they let me know how they have theirs wired up?

Many thanks

Chiliblue
Click to expand...

Can you select which sentences the RL70 receives gps data on in case one of the other units is changing it. eg GPRMC may be sent and GPGGA or GPGLL expected or vice versa.
 
ianj99 said:
Can you select which sentences the RL70 receives gps data on in case one of the other units is changing it. eg GPRMC may be sent and GPGGA or GPGLL expected or vice versa.
Click to expand...

That doesn't make any sense. The RL70 is expecting (and receiving) Seatalk, not NMEA.

Pete
 
Good point, not on the boat to play right now. I can control what NMEA sentences are outputted by the GPS receiver. (I of course selected every sentence) All of them are ones listed in the ST60 Multi manual as ones they translate.

Not delved deep into the plotters menus - I find Raymarine menu systems very un-intuitive.

I also still have the NMEA out enabled on the ST60 Multi so that also might effect things.

More head scratching... It could of course be a bad cable going from the instruments to the plotter.
 
The RL70 is expecting data from both Seatalk and NMEA, it just takes them by priority...Seatalk if it is present; if not NMEA. From memory you can't change that order.
 
I think you will need a seatalk/NMEA bridge which will convert the output from the NMEA device into seatalk and pop it all on the seatalk bus. It's a little box of tricks with the usual Raymarine price.
 
Chiliblue said:
More head scratching... It could of course be a bad cable going from the instruments to the plotter.
Click to expand...

Can you see any of your other seatalk nav data on the plotter? Manual says you can display nav data (wind, depth log etc.) in data boxes, although default for everything is "off" (chapter 7.3 talks about enabling it). If you can see nav data over seatalk, then cabling isn't your problem.
 
No you misunderstood my point. The transmission method is not relevant in my post. Its simply that one of the seatalk units may be changing the sentence to one the RL70 isn't setup to use when its sending it over seatalk. RMC contains more data than GLL or GGA so to reduce the throughput on the sealtalk bus, it may be used instead as a more efficient use of the limited bandwidth.
 
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ianj99 said:
No you misunderstood my point. The transmission method is not relevant in my post. Its simply that one of the seatalk units may be changing the sentence to one the RL70 isn't setup to use when its sending it over seatalk. RMC contains more data than GLL or GGA so to reduce the throughput on the sealtalk bus, it may be used instead as a more efficient use of the limited bandwidth.
Click to expand...

Then I also misunderstand :-). There isn't a one to one mapping of NMEA sentences to seatalk data. NMEA to seatalk "conversion" tends to involve breaking down an NMEA sentence in to its parts. A GLL might result in seatalk commands 50,51 and 54. RMC would give you that plus 52,53,56 and 99. The multi claims to recognise and convert RMC and GLL. It will presumably be the same 50 and 51 commands it puts out for LAT and LON in either case.
 
laika said:
Can you see any of your other seatalk nav data on the plotter? Manual says you can display nav data (wind, depth log etc.) in data boxes, although default for everything is "off" (chapter 7.3 talks about enabling it). If you can see nav data over seatalk, then cabling isn't your problem.
Click to expand...

Sadly no...but for good reason, depth and log tranducers aren't wired up yet and the wind tranponder requires a trip to the top of the mast....the winches are currently being replaced so that isn't an option right now.

What I can do is check the signal current on a multi meter on the plotter end of the cable to check whether anything is coming that far. Certainly the instrument circuit is getting 12v but with that doesn't really mean much to the plotter as it doesn't use the v+ terminal of seatalk.
 
I have a Garmin 750 feeding nmea to an ST60 multi.
It translates the input onto the ST bus and it all appears on my ST4000+ I.e waypoints etc.
However I also have an ST60 graphic that should do the same but when I connected the Garmin to it, although it displayed itself nothing translated to the ST bus so clearly they can fail!
You may have a fault in the multi.
Whether the out is switched to alarm or nmea makes no difference. The manual tells you that. It also tells you exactly which sentences it can translate to ST.
Raymarine warned me not to connect nmea to two instruments in the same chain it can cause confusion.
 
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ianj99 said:
No you misunderstood my point. The transmission method is not relevant in my post. Its simply that one of the seatalk units may be changing the sentence to one the RL70 isn't setup to use when its sending it over seatalk. RMC contains more data than GLL or GGA so to reduce the throughput on the sealtalk bus, it may be used instead as a more efficient use of the limited bandwidth.
Click to expand...

This is complete gibberish. Seatalk doesn't use NMEA sentences at all.

Pete
 
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