Simrad AI50 AIS

[Wandering Star]

Anyone got or used one? My new to me boat has one installed, it’s about 10 years old. I can’t test it and always told myself I’d only ever use a receiver, not a receiver/transmitter, but here we are! it looks in very good condition although the rail mount GPS antenna casing is damaged. I can purchase a new antenna for £110. So what I want to know is, is it worthwhile learning how to use it, paying for a new GPS antenna etc or should I junk it and fit a simple AIS receiver to my Raymarine C80 ?

 

[Far Horizon]

I have one, it works it’s great. The guard zone, the details of CPA, TCPA are all invaluable. If you’ve got it and it’s working I’d keep it.

 

[harvey38]

Try to get yours working. I don see the point in having a receiver only, if everyone (leisure boats) were just receiving and no-one transmitting, there would be nothing to receive.

 

[Bilgediver]

Anyone got or used one? My new to me boat has one installed, it’s about 10 years old. I can’t test it and always told myself I’d only ever use a receiver, not a receiver/transmitter, but here we are! it looks in very good condition although the rail mount GPS antenna casing is damaged. I can purchase a new antenna for £110. So what I want to know is, is it worthwhile learning how to use it, paying for a new GPS antenna etc or should I junk it and fit a simple AIS receiver to my Raymarine C80 ?

Looking at your manual it seems this antenna should work. It has a BNC connector .

External Marine GPS Antenna for Garmin Boat GPS GPSMAP with BNC Male Connector | eBay

 

[Far Horizon]

You mentioned you can't test it - will it turn on? There's nothing to be lost in doing that - if you have power.

Do you get any error messages after giving it enough time to boot up? It doesn't take long to boot up, only about 15 seconds.

What does the display show? The outline of the coast? (note: that is a setting you need to turn on, it works well on my unit.)

The display will show a GPS error initially, it will say that for about the first minute until it has enough GPS satellite fixes. The GPS case might be cracked but that doesn't mean it doesn't work.

You might still receive the details of other vessels around you after a minute or two as the data they transmit is received on the AIS aerial, not the GPS aerial.

Good luck with the new boat.