Raystar 125 GPS problems

[Zephyr362]

I have a Raystar 125 GPS which has just gone out of warranty so sent it off to Raymarine for repair. It was resetting every 2 hours or so.
Raymarine have found the fault and have offered to exchange it for just over £200 which is not good as I can buy it almost as cheap locally. It does seem expensive as you can buy a handheld GPS to less that half of that.
Has anyone else had similar problems with their Raystar 125?

 

[NorthUp]

Two failures- both times the green LED on top still did its thing, but the data out was corrupted.
I fitted a digital Yacht active antenna for less than half the price of the Raystar:

http://www.mesltd.co.uk/digital-yacht-gps105-active-antenna-p-1124.html

 

[crisjones]

There was another thread relating to the same problem about 12 months ago.

If I recall it seems there is a small coin cell battery in the GPS unit that may need replacing - although this should be very unlikely in your case if the unit is only just out of warranty.

I had an older 120 unit start doing the same and I changed it for a new 125 which solved the problem. I have not tried taking the old unit apart to change the battery because it is still fitted to the coachroof of the boat. I mounted the new unit underneath the coachroof and performance is fine. The reason it is not mounted in the open is that I have heard a few reports about the plastic degrading over time in the tropics and that is where we hope to be going.

I would first go back to Raymarine and complain that the unit is clearly not of "merchantable quality" for its designed purpose and insist on a much cheaper repair or replacement. Obviously their recent financial problems are making them much harsher on repair / warranty costs.

 

[alan]

But I imagine that the DigitalYacht antenna did not have a "Seatalk" output, which could be a limitation.
Alan.

 

[NorthUp]

Correct, no Seatalk, but the Raytheon chartplotters will accept NMEA inputs, and will output the same on to (eg) a DSC VHF etc.

 

[pvb]

True, but the problem with most Raymarine plotters is only having one NMEA port. Having a SeaTalk GPS is useful in the context of overall interfacing.